Eggmans New Weapons
by IHeartSonAmy
Summary: Eggman has a load of new tricks up his sleeve as once again he tries to get rid of our favourite blue hero. But will Sonic be able to overcome his greatest fears when Eggman gets wind of what really lies in the hedgehogs heart?  Rewritten
1. The Return Of Metal

Heya guys. I decided to redo this story because a)I was reading through my old version and realised that it was quite rushed b)I was proud of my plot c)It was my first chapter story and I wanted to improve it. I don't have much time to write at the minute either, so I thought I could edit my previous stories and improve them...and this one's first on my list.

I want this story to go out to everyone who supported me the first time I wrote this. Honestly, if they hadn't, I would have just given up on it. I had a major case of writer's block and the encouraging reviews helped so much! So thank you guys! I'm sure you all know who you are...xx

Anyways, enough of me blabbering. On with the story...

The Return of Metal 

"Hah, look at you. You're nothing but a pathetic little blue nuisance in the way my global domination scheme." Eggman taunted. He was yet again hovering around in his Egg Mobile, crafted specially to suit his egg-like frame. Next to him stood a big robot that looked like an oversized blender and a dozen red robots which bore a resemblance to Eggman himself.

"You didn't tell me you were giving out complimentary milkshakes Eggy. Personally I'm more of a chilli dog guy, but for you I'll make an exception." Sonic replied, arms crossed, wearing a familiar cocky grin.

"Well, in that case. How about I add a special ingredient to yours. It's a rare flower, only found in Sonic the hedgehog's heart. A little pink something I like to call, Sonic Bait."

"Wait, what?" said a Sonic said with a confused look, soon turning to shock. He let his arms drop and made a step towards the new arrival.

Next to Eggman appeared a cage with a propeller on top. Inside was a pretty annoyed looking Amy Rose with her arms folded impatiently. Bearing a striking resemblance to the blue blur himself when being made to wait.

"Let's see how well you cope with my creations when your heart's on the line. You have two minutes before the cage reaches the blender of the Egg Appliance!"

"She's not my girlfriend and that's not even a challenge, I could do it in my sleep!" Sonic retorted, his cocky grin returning to his face as he headed towards the oncoming robots.

"Man, is that dude running out of ideas and names or what?" Sonic shouted down his wrist communicator, bopping a robot on the head with his foot as he jumped over it.

"He sure hides the fact that he has an IQ of 300 well. We're on our way just in case" Tails replied.

'_I have to get her out of there, but I can't with these freaks in the way. I'm gonna have to make short work of them.'_ Sonic mused.

Sonic used spin dashes and homing attacks on the robots that stood in his way, often taking them down two or three at a time. Making sure each robot was down, he stood back to admire his handiwork.

A bright flash of silver obscured Sonic's vision as he was caught off guard. Something silver hit him around the back of the head, the impact so hard and unexpected that Sonic was sure he could see triple of everything.

"SONIC!"

He heard Amy scream out his name helplessly as his vision started to blur, the pain causing him to fall to his knees and clutch his head in agony.

At seeing her hero collapse Amy got out her hammer and started pounding at the metal bars that sealed her in.

"LET...ME...OUT...OF...HERE!" Hitting the metal with her hammer at every syllable, Amy pounded hopelessly at the bars of her prison. Tears streaming down her face as Sonic's limp form propelled her onwards to no avail, the hammer left nothing more than a few dents in the strong metal.

Using the last of his strength Sonic managed to activate his wrist communicator "Tails!" he shouted harshly. "Save Amy, you've... got one ...minute". Feeling satisfied with himself, Sonic succumbed to the inevitable darkness.

A plane soared over head seconds later, as Tails arrived in the X Tornado. Knuckles, Cream and Cheese tagging along in the passenger seats of the machine.

"Knuckles go check on Sonic, we'll get Amy." Tails said in a worried tone with Knuckles grunted in response. Tails manoeuvred towards the ground to allow Knuckles to assist his brother before to help a distraught Amy.

Knuckles landed on the hard ground with a thump, ignoring the pain he endured as a result. He ran towards Sonic but was intercepted by a silvery blue metal hedgehog.

"Stay where you are...or your friends gonna go on a one way trip without a return ticket." The metallic voice rang out.

Knuckles ground to a halt and took a few steps back reluctantly, holding his hands up in front of him.

'_Metal Sonic...I thought we already defeated him...guess he didn't learn his lesson the first time.'_

"Let's settle this between us...no need to get someone who can't defend themselves involved." Knuckles stated, hoping that the robotic hedgehog wouldn't refuse the offer.

"Hmphh! You're no challenge by yourself, but if fighting you is the only way I can get you out of my way, then so be it!" The robot then went into fighting stance, not much different to that of a certain blue hedgehogs.

Both Echidna and robot lunged at each other with force, neither wanting to lose the resulting battle. Meanwhile Tails and Cream had managed to release Amy from her small prison using Tails laser device. The only difficulty they were facing now was refraining her from jumping off the plane at such a height.

"Miss Amy, you can't. We're too high up! At least let Mr Tails' plane get closer to the ground." Cream spoke sweetly, concern ringing out from her words.

"Amy! Stop struggling...you're gonna hurt yourself and then you'll be no help to him at all!" Tails shouted, trying to make the hedgehog see sense.

"I have to see if Sonic's okay!" Amy screamed back, whilst struggling to get out of their grip.

Tails thanked his lucky stars he had decided to put the Tornado on auto-pilot, as currently both him and Cream were fighting for a lost cause.

The X Tornado landed quickly, even if it was much too slow for Amy's liking, and everyone jumped out. Amy, Cream and Cheese ran over to Sonic, while Tails raced after Knuckles and Metal Sonic knowing that Knuckles would need all the help he could get.

...xxx...

Both rivals dodged blow after blow, constantly moving in fear of getting struck down by the other. Knuckles and Metal Sonic locked hands and were both attempting to knock the other off balance. Tails flew in behind Metal Sonic, kicking him in the back of his head and temporarily disabling him.

Metal recovered from the blow quickly but was bombarded with punches and kicks from Knuckles and Tails who had used the time to gain the upper hand.

"I will get you...all of you!" Those were Metal Sonic's last words before his power supply failed him, due to the severe injuries he sustained from fighting.

...xxx...

"SONIC!" Amy screamed running and collapsing next to her blue hero with tears swimming in her eyes. "Please be okay!" she whispered more to herself than anyone else before starting to sob quietly.

She heard footsteps behind her, but didn't turn to see who it was. The only person she wanted to see was Sonic, healthy and active, just like he normally was.

Cream and Cheese stood behind Amy, not wanting to disturb her, Cheese chaoing quietly to calm her down . They were soon joined by Tails and Knuckles, the latter seeming a little bruised.

Eggman hovered down to the group to give them some last words before their next encounter, just like he always did.

"I'll get you next time you annoying little creatures. You may have defeated Metal Sonic, but at the price of Sonic the Hedgehog. That's one point to me I think! Ha Ha Ha! Let me know if he does survive, I'll need to prepare some more robots for him!" With that, Eggman left dragging his oversized blender with him, slightly disappointed that he didn't get a chance to use his latest toy.

Eggman's words stung Amy like a needle through the heart. _'...at the price of Sonic the Hedgehog' '...if he survives'_. The words kept going round her head, as if they were deliberately trying to torment her further. Sniffing loudly, Amy focused on what the rest of the group members were now discussing.

At first she didn't realise that she was being asked a question, but when everyones gaze fell on her she listened intently.

"Amy, does he have a pulse?" Knuckles questioned.

Between muffled sobs, Knuckles managed to decipher an _'I was too scared to check...'_ Knuckles bowed his head respectively as Tails lifted Sonic's arm and felt his wrist for a pulse.

He soon let out a breath of hope as he found the throb of his heartbeat. It was faint, but it was still there, and that's what mattered the most.

"He's okay, just unconscious and a bit battered. I'm sure he'll be running around in no time." He managed a small smile at Amy before getting the X Tornado ready to fly everyone home again.

Knuckles lifted up Sonic and all four remaining heroes followed Tails to the X Tornado, neither of them saying a word the whole way home. The only noises were the sobs that would escape from Amy every couple of minutes; no matter how hard she tried to keep them in.

They reached home in almost ten minutes, all filing into Tail's house with Knuckles having slung Sonic over his shoulder.

He laid him down on his bed and everyone left him alone, giving the azure hedgehog his much needed rest. Tails, having thought ahead, went to fill the X Tornado just in case while the others went to the living room.

...xxx...

'Ughh! What happened? Why does my head hurt so much? Wait a second...Eggman... Amy!'

Sonic quickly sat up to find himself in his bed, a shooting pain passed through his head. Looking around him, he saw a sleeping Amy leaning on the side of the bed, gently holding his hand. His heart warmed at the gesture before he decided that he needed a run.

Sonic got up, ignoring the fact that his head throbbed like mad and slowly released his hand from the pink hedgehogs grip. He managed to remove his hand from Amy's but as soon as he had, she started stirring.

Sonic ran over to the window and looked out casually to hide the fact that he was looking at her. He couldn't help but smile at how cute she looked asleep before realising that his head felt heavier than usual.

Lifting up his gloved hands, he found a bandage surrounding his head. He slowly shoved the bandage and slid it off, finding it quite uncomfortable.

Amy shifted slightly before slowly opening her eyes to reveal a pair of dark green orbs. Glancing at the bed, she was filled with panic when she found it vacant.

She quickly stood up; but her panic was short lived as she spotted Sonic standing by the window, looking out to the sky.

"Sonic..." she whimpered. He turned round and smiled at her. "...I'm sorry...it's all my fault..." she continued, her eyes filling with tears once again.

She was cut off as Sonic walked over to her and held her hands in his. He looked her in the eyes, and gently lifted her hands up to his chest.

"Ames. It's not your fault, if anyone's it's mine. I should have been watching my back rather than mocking the robots." She giggled at him and then managed a small smile with a tear escaping her eye.

"I'm sorry, guess I should really watch my back too." Amy replied, only just noticing that Sonic was holding her hands.

"Or at the least, you could get Tails to make you an Eggman detector!" Sonic joked as he saw her beautiful jade eyes glimmer and twinkle. Realising he was still holding her hands he let go, turning towards the door to hide his blushing muzzle. Both hedgehogs left the room to find the rest of their friends.

'_Why did I do that? Her hands are incredibly soft though. Wait...what am I thinking! She did look cute when she was sleeping. Stop that! Your Sonic the Hedgehog, no one can know she's one of your greatest weaknesses.'_

Sonic mentally argued with himself the whole way to the workshop, barely noticing when he had arrived.

Tails had got Knuckles to help him update the X Tornado and had set Cream and Cheese searching through all the clutter in the workshop for the Chaos Emerald Detectors.

They all stopped what they were doing and ran over to Sonic when he entered the room. Sonic was too busy in thought to realise that they were talking to him.

"Sonic! Are you alright? Ya didn't get hit too hard did ya?" Tails said with a questioning look on his face. Sonic looked at his brother, a glazy look in his eye.

"Huh! Oh right, I'm fine. Just thinking bout...stuff" Sonic replied rubbing the back of his head subconsciously with an embarrassed smile on his muzzle.

"I'll see ya guys tomorrow, I'm kinda tired. Bye Sonic." Amy said whilst giving Sonic a soft hug, rather than her usual glomp. Sonic did nothing but stood and stare at her with a dumb smile on his face. With that she left for her own house, being waved off by Cream and Cheese.

"So..." Knuckles said casually. "What happened between you two?" he continued with a smirk.

"What! Nothing! Why would anything happen between us?" Sonic started going redder by the second.

"Sonic! Don't give me that 'nothing' excuse. You're as red as the ruby chaos emerald. And..." Knuckles said slyly.

"And what!" Sonic said defensively, gaining a fighting stance and narrowing his eyes at the red echidna.

"Cool it buddy. I was just gonna say that you looked like you enjoyed that hug!"

Knuckles jumped out of the way with his hands up as the exact spot he had been stood in was attacked by a blue blur. Knuckles chuckled to himself before heading off to find Cream and Cheese.

"See ya lover boy. Cream, Cheese, come on. Vanilla's gonna start worrying if you're not home soon and I've left the emerald unguarded too long as it is." Knuckles said heading for the front door.

Sonic knew when he was beaten, but... it didn't stop him messing with Knuckles.

"Don't forget to make sure your bat girlfriend hasn't stolen it will ya Knux!" Sonic retorted, and was met with an angry snarl from Knuckles as he headed out of the door with Cream and Cheese giggling behind him.

Tails rolled his eyes at the scene before continuing to polish the final section of the Tornado before heading off to the kitchen to get a snack.

...xxx...

Amy was walking down her pathway humming quietly to herself. Memories of how Sonic had held her hands filled her mind, her cheeks flushing at the thought of it.

She got out her key and turned the lock on her white and pink door. Swinging open the door, Amy twirled inside, still feeling on top of the world.

Coming to a stop, she was met with a pair of evil looking, glowing red eyes. Amy eyes widened in horror before she tried to turn and run.

"SONIC!" she screamed instinctively before she was grabbed by a pair of cold metal hands. She felt a sharp pain in her left arm and stopped struggling as she succumbed to the oncoming darkness that was covering her vision. Amy had only one thought as her eyelids fell drowsily.

'Sonic...'


	2. Instincts And A Ruined Reunion

Thanks to 01sonamy01, JazzTheHedgehogSingingStar, Silverdawn2010, ShadowMaster193 and Koollolly for your supportive reviews ^_^

Ooooh! I'm actually loving redoing this story...xx I forgot how fun it was :)

Instincts and a Ruined Reunion

The sun was setting on this side of Mobius as the planets hero gazed out at the sky. The vast array of colours blending into each other perfectly. The oranges, violets, reds, yellows and...pink. The exact pink of Amy Rose, but on her it looked so much more beautiful Sonic thought. She was definitely growing on the azure hedgehog, a lot more than he first expected her to. A lot more than anyone expected her to.

'_SONIC!'_

"Huh!"

Sonic jumped up from the bench he was reclining on and looked around the workshop in alarm.

No one? That was strange. He could have sworn he had heard someone cry out his name. A certain pink someone.

He walked around the room and into the kitchen to find Tails eating a tuna sandwich.

"Tails, did you hear Am-... someone call out my name?" Sonic asked questioningly, trying to hide his suspicion of who it might have been.

"No, Why?" Tails replied, curious as to what was his older brother was on about.

"Oh, nothing! It's just...I'm probably just being paranoid. Never mind." Sonic waved off his suspicion giving the kitsune a reassuring thumbs up.

Sonic left the room and resumed lying down on the bench. He closed his eyes and smiled as a pink figure came into mind.

'I could have sworn I heard Amy shout my name. Why is she always on my mind anyway? I mean, she's just a friend... a really good one...one that I possibly may have feelings for...someone who could be more than just my friend... Knock it off Sonic! You have to keep pushing her away. It's the only way..."

'_Sonic...' _

This time Sonic was sure he heard her voice as clear as day. Sonic jumped up even faster than before, breaking his own records in the process.

_RING RING!_

'_That might be her, I have to find out if it's is or not' _Sonic raced out of the workshop and into the hallway, following the sound of the ringing.

"I'll get it!" Tails shouted heading for the hallway, slightly surprised that Sonic was there too. Not at the fact that he was beaten to the phone, just that Sonic answering the phone was an extremely rare sight.

Sonic looked at the caller ID and Tails was sure he saw his smile drop slightly. Tails harboured his own suspicion on who Sonic thought might be on the phone, but kept quiet at the time. Sonic picked it up and put it on loudspeaker so Tails could hear what was being said at the same time.

"Hey Knux! Wait, don't tell me. The emerald's gone and so has your girlfriend?" Sonic questioned with a sly grin on his face.

"Well I dunno bout the master emerald, but your girlfriends certainly not okay!" Knuckles shouted, worry evident in his tone.

Sonic's forest green eyes widened as his grip on the phone loosened.

"Me and Cream heard her scream and we're heading over to her place right now...Sonic...are you still there? Sonic!"

"Knuckles! I'm right here!" Sonic shouted, running past him with Tails not far behind.

Sonic had grabbed a hold of Tails and ran straight for Amy's house leaving behind a sonic boom. The phone was left on the floor where Sonic had dropped it out of shock.

'_I can't believe it. I really did hear her calling me...but...how?'_ Sonic questioned himself.

Knuckles, Cream and Tails reached Amy's house to find Sonic cautiously walking down her pathway. Cream and Cheese were flying and trying to see in through the upstairs windows.

"Mister Sonic! I can't see her!" Cream said with a worried look towards Sonic.

Knuckles felt a breeze behind him and turned to see Tails flying up into the air to join Cream in her search. He turned around and nearly hit Sonic out of surprise.

"SONIC! Don't sneak up on me!"

"She's not here..." Sonic muttered darkly. "I'm gonna go check the surrounding area, take Cream and Cheese home. It's too dangerous for them to be around here!"

Sonic ran off to search the nearby fields before Knuckles had any time to object.

"She didn't put up much of a fight, there's no signs of a struggle" Knuckles whispered to himself before heading over to Tails and Cream.

...xxx...

'_This is my fault. I heard her shout my name, but I still didn't check on her. I bet Eggman has something to do with this, but why is he attacking so soon after getting beaten this morning. He probably thought I was still unconscious, and that ambushing now would be his best bet at fulfilling his lifelong dream. He's gonna regret taking my Amy without my permission...not that he was gonna get it anyway.'_

After running round the perimeter five times and deciding that she was indeed with Eggman, Sonic headed back towards Amy's house. Just as Sonic expected, there was Tails, anxiously awaiting his arrival.

"Sonic...are you alright?" Tails asked sympathetically when he had finally come to a stop.

Sonic looked into his best friends blue eyes and decided to tell the truth. It would be better to be upfront with him, so that he knew exactly what was at stake. And anyway, what kinda hero would he be if he lied to his friends?

"Tails...if I'm honest with you...then no...I'm not alright." Sonic turned so he was now facing away from the golden kitsune. He took in a deep breath and continued.

"I heard her...she called out my name...and I didn't go! If anything happens to her I'll never forgive myself!" With the last sentence Sonic turned to face the kitsune and was slightly surprised at finding a wet substance leaking from his jade eyes.

Sonic quickly wiped it away, hoping that his best friend had not seen it...or would at least pretend he hadn't.

"I'm gonna tell Knuckles to meet us at my place. I'll get the X Tornado ready to find Eggman's latest base. Oh, and Sonic. You don't have to tell me anything...I've seen the way you look at her. Don't worry, we're gonna get her back." Tails said with sparks of hope glinting in his blue orbs.

Sonic gazed out at the little light there was left on the horizon, silently praying that Tails was right. After a few moments of just soaking in what had happened, he grabbed a hold of Tails and ran to his workshop.

...xxx...

Amy rose stirred from her forced sleep, shifting uncomfortably. A robotic hedgehog stood outside her prison, guarding and preventing her escape.

"Dr, I think she's waking up...do you want me to give her more sedative...just in case?" Metal questioned the mad man before him.

"No, I don't think that's necessary. I want her to see the demise of the blue nuisance with her own eyes; it's much more entertaining for **me** that way" Eggman said whilst pressing countless buttons on his high tech equipment, a smirk appearing on his face.

"Now go hide...you are supposed to be a _surprise_ for my young blue friend, remember" Eggman instructed with a sly smile creeping on to his face.

'_Ughh, why am I so dizzy?'_ Amy attempted to open her heavy eyelids but was still too weak to do so. She eventually forced them open and squealed in shock, shuffling as far back as possible. Surrounded by metal bars, the pink hedgehog saw a retreating figure of a hedgehog, glinting in the light.

'_That's right; I saw a pair of red eyes and then was caught by something...that must have been Metal. Except he was destroyed earlier...Eggman can't rebuild him that fast can he? Then there was the pain in my arm...'_

Amy looked down at her arm and saw a small pinprick sized cut_. 'He injected me?'_ She gathered enough strength to sit up and examine where she was. Looking around the room she saw Eggman tapping frantically at what seemed like a keyboard with hundreds of keys and flashing lights.

She herself was trapped in a metal cage, similar to the one she was in earlier that very same day. But this one had thicker bars and no propeller. "Guess this just isn't my day!" Amy said thinking out loud.

Eggman swivelled round at the sound of her voice and a smile lit up his face.

"Oh goody, you're up." he sneered, leaving his computer screen and keyboard to grin at her evilly.

"Never mind that! You should be more worried about how Sonic's gonna kick your butt when he finds out where I am! Why can't you just give up already..." Amy screamed through the bars.

"Says the girl who chases around Sonic, when the rest of the world knows he's not gonna stop for anyone, especially not some annoying brat like you! How about this, I'll give up when you do. Don't you Sonic gets tired of having to save you all the time? If I was him, then I'd be glad you got kidnapped. It'd mean you'd be outta my way." Eggman retorted with a sly smile.

Amy was shocked at Eggman's words and felt tears pricking her eyes. She shut them quickly, hiding her watery jade eyes from her capturer. She remained silent for a few seconds before she was overwhelmed by her tears and landed on a heap on the floor.

'_That's it pinky, cry it all out. If you're hurting...then the blue fuzz ball will get angry, making his demise come faster! How long did he think he could hide it from the rest of the world? Pffh! Letting love into your life only weakens you and makes you more vulnerable! And the blue hedgie is gonna prove just that!'_Eggman mused whilst watching Amy breakdown before him. He then turned to resume typing on his computer.

...xxx...

"I found a large current of energy being emitted from Emerald Forest. Eggman must have set up his base there. I'm locking onto the source of the power right now!" Tails cried over the constant whirring of the X Tornado.

"Get a fix on his location and land us near it!" Sonic shouted back, anger clearly visible by his expression.

'_I'll show him what happens when you mess with Sonic the Hedgehog and his friends. He may have had be down for the count earlier...but this, I'm not gonna go easy on anything he throws at me!' _

"I got a fix, looks like were gonna have to land right on it." Tails shouted

"Knuckles you smash the ceiling and then we split up and search for Amy. First to find her calls the others and we all meet back here, alright." Sonic instructed, a lot calmer than he felt inside.

Knuckles and Tails nodded as Tails attempted to land on top of Eggman's most recent base.

After five minutes, Tail's had successfully landed the plane. The trio clambered out as Knuckles set to work on pounding the metal beneath them. Tails fiddled with his wrist communicator whilst Sonic just stood tapping his foot impatiently as he so often did.

"I'm waiting!" Sonic remarked when Knuckles let lose another blast of power at the metal below.

"I know you're worried about her, we all are. But annoying me isn't gonna make me work any faster." Knuckles said gruffly, annoyed at Sonic's inability to wait.

After a few more blows the metal gave way and the trio jumped down the freshly made hole. Landing swiftly, the first thing they noticed was the large group of robots surrounding them.

"Aw crud...and there was me thinking we wouldn't be getting sidetracked." Knuckles moaned before quickly getting to work and smashing a robot into two others causing all three to break into hundreds of peices.

"Sonic, me and Knuckles got this. You go find Amy, you're faster than us." Tails said whilst spinning another robot into the air causing it to break up.

Sonic nodded in acknowledgement and darted off, dodging any robots that came in his way. Determination driving him onwards, as well as all the thoughts of what Eggman could be putting Amy through.

'_Eggman's probably got her in the centre of the base; he __**does**__ like being the centre of attention. I'll check their first'_

Sonic stopped outside the largest door in the entire base. _'Well, here goes nothing!'_ With that Sonic curled up into a ball and spin dashed right through the door. Cautiously entering, Sonic tried to get used to the bright lights.

'_Man...The hallways aren't this bright. I must be in the right place then.'_

He spotted Amy in a cage and made to run towards but was yet again interrupted by a blue glint.

"Nice to see you again...Sonic!" The newcomer spat.

"Metal? I thought you were destroyed earlier...you know...right after your sneak attack!" Sonic said.

"That my friend was a prototype. I'm the real deal...and your girlfriend is gonna pay big time when I'm through with you!" Metal said with an edge of coldness in his metallic voice.

"You better not have harmed her in any way!" Sonic shouted dodging as Metal came hurtling towards him.

"Hah! She's fine...for now. Although she did cry a lot. Poor girl, looks like she'll have a lot more to cry about when I'm finished with you!" Metal sneered.

"Is that a threat...or are you just trying to wind me up! Cause whatever it is, is just gonna make me beat you faster!"

"SONIC!" Amy screeched as she noticed the fight going on outside her cage. Amy had been in too much of a daze to notice before, but was now shouting words of encouragement to her hero.

'_Ughh, he's gonna be harder to beat than I first thought, where's he getting all this energy from. He may be strong, but he's probably not very clever.'_ Sonic thought whilst jumping in the air to avoid being crushed by Metals powerful punches.

"Even if by some miracle you do beat me..." Metal dodged any spin attack.

'_That's it, keep talking. That way you're not paying full attention to me!'_

"Who's to say your pink friend will be okay..." Metal moved away but was caught off guard as Sonic swerved towards him at the last second, worked up by the threats.

The impact caused Metal to fall to the ground, arms and legs flailing aimlessly.

Metal was bombarded with punches and kicks as Sonic gave him no time to recover.

"Next time. You may wanna think twice about threatening me whilst fighting" Sonic shouted, delivering the final spin dash. Metal jerked uncontrollably before his eyes faded and he powered down. Metal then busted open, nuts and screws flying in all directions.

Sonic dodged the debris before walking over to Amy's cage, leaving behind nothing but a pile of scrap metal.

He spin dashed the door, creating a hole big enough for Amy to get through. As soon as she had hopped out, Sonic quite unexpectedly pulled her into a warm hug. Amy's eyes widened in shock, but she returned the hug with love.

"You alright Ames, he didn't hurt you did he." Sonic asked, looking deep into her jade eyes.

Amy pulled away from the hug and shook her head. She smiled at the azure hedgehog before planting a soft kiss on his cheek.

"Thanks Sonic. I know I can always count on you." Amy giggled at his expression before she spotted Tails and Knuckles.

Sonic opened his mouth as if to say something but no words came out, he was in total shock. Instead he ended up smiling and rubbing the back of his head bashfully.

"Amy, your okay!" Tails shouted whilst running over to Amy and hugging her tightly before releasing her. Knuckles just nodded at her, arms folded as usual/

"So much for calling us when you found her, eh lover boy." Knuckles chuckled at Sonic before noticing the pile of junk on the floor.

"Guess we missed all the fun, huh!" Knuckles remarked before walking over to the pile and searching through all the scrap metal.

"Knuckles?" All three Mobians eyed Knuckles curiously as he continued his search.

"GOT IT!" Knuckles shouted as he held up a red emerald.

"Metal was being powered by an emerald; but how did you know? He still had a lot more power than he should have done." Sonic stated, confused.

"Metal? I thought we destroyed him. And I'm a guardian. I can sense the emeralds you idiot!" Knuckles replied, noting how oblivious the blue hedgehog could really be.

"Okay okay...take a chill pill dude. Apparently what you fought was a prototype. I mean, that is the only explanation of why _you_ managed to beat him without _me _earlier on." Sonic smirked.

Knuckles grunted in anger before ignoring the blue hedgehog for the time being.

"Sonic, you were angry when you were fighting Metal, right." Tails stated matter-of-factly.

"Yeah...who wouldn't be?"

"Sonic...Then you're the one who gave him the extra power." Tails continued.

"Yeah...I have no idea what you're on about. I didn't give him any power? That would just be dumb." Sonic stated.

"I getcha Tails. The emeralds are powered by raw emotion. The red emerald is powered by anger." Knuckles said, making his way back to the group.

"What about the rest of them?" Amy asked

"Each one is powered by a different emotion. Red is anger, Yellow is happiness, Pink is love, Green is jealousy, White is sorrow, Orange is embarrassment and Blue is fear." Tails said matter-of-factly.

Amy nodded to show she understood, and glanced at Sonic whose emerald eyes had glazed over. She shook his shoulder to bring him back down to reality when the doors slammed shut.

The lights immediately dimmed as the group huddled together. A large screen folded out of the wall and Eggman's repulsive face was visible to the gang. Sonic stood in front of Amy, keeping one arm in front of her protectively, blocking her from Eggman's view.

"You aren't going anywhere!" Eggman shouted. "You destroyed by robot, took my emerald. Don't think I'm gonna let you get out of here easily." He muttered before shutting the screen.

Sonic heard a small whizzing noise and turned to face the gang to discuss their options.

A loud scream filled his ears as Amy screamed out in pain as she fell to the floor clutching her arm. Sticking out of it was a small needle with a purple fluid injecting itself into her. Sonic clutched her hand and pulled the syringe out, willing her to be okay.

Tails took the needle from his brother as fast as he could but Amy was already turning pale and her grip loosened on Sonic's hand.

"I THINK IT'S POISON" Tails shouted, panic clearly recognisable in his tone.

"EGGMAN!" Sonic shouted as he stood up and smashed the giant screen into oblivion, his blood boiling.

...xxx...


	3. A Challenge Is Set

I added a new section to the bottom of this because I think it will help with later events in the story. Other than that...I hope you guys are enjoying this as much as I am! ^_^

Thanks to 01sonamy01, Lexi The Hedgehog, SilverDawn2010, Koollolly, and JazzTheHedgehogSingingStar for your reviews...xx

A Challenge Is Set

"EGGMAN!" Sonic shouted as he stood up and smashed the giant screen into oblivion, his blood boiling.

Sonic's seething form turned and looked at the rose hedgehog on the floor, being comforted by the golden kitsune. Knuckles on the other hand was smashing blows into the now sealed doorway, using all the strength he could muster to crack it open.

Sonic, now much calmer, walked over to Amy and knelt down beside her. Gazing into her jade green eyes, he wrapped his strong arms around her frail figure and pulled her close to himself. She whimpered as he whispered into her ear. "It's okay Amy...you're gonna be fine. I'll make sure of it."

Sonic pulled back a little and gave her a small smile of reassurance, before standing and turning to Knuckles.

"Knuckles, give me the emerald." Knuckles obediently stopped attacking and threw the emerald in Sonic's direction.

"Guys, hold on tight. I'm gonna Chaos Control us outta here." He continued as he picked up Amy and cradled her in his arms. Both Tails and Knuckles grabbed onto either one of Sonic's arms as he cried out "CHAOS CONTROL!"

All four Mobians landed in a heap on Tails' living room carpet, with Amy still huddled in Sonic's arms.

Tails and Knuckles stood up and brushed themselves off. Sonic on the other remained on the floor with a worried expression on his face, gazing intently at the girl huddled in his arms.

"Tails...I'm gonna leave Amy here with you. Me and Knux will go back and see if we can find out what poison it was or get the antidote." After a few minutes of silence passed as everyone gathered their thoughts, Sonic lifted himself off the floor and gently placed Amy on Tails couch.

Tails ran off to gather some equipment while Knuckles went to the kitchen to pick up a few supplies. Sonic looked down at the sleeping pink rose before him.

"Amy...I'm gonna save you, and kick Eggman's butt in the process for doing this to you...I um...I...I love you..." He pushed her quills out of her face and placed a gentle and tender kiss on her forehead.

Sonic turned to head for the kitchen but stopped as he saw a wide-eyed Tails stood in the hallway staring right at him. Tails slowly walked into the room and dumped all his equipment on the spare couch before turning to face his friend.

"I heard that!" Tails said accusingly, with a smirk on his face.

"Heard what?" Sonic said casually, trying to hide his embarrassment, but his ever-growing red cheeks did nothing to help him out of his situation.

"You...you admitted it. Man, why didn't I leave my video camera on this morning." Tails joked.

Sonic mentally kicked himself for not making sure he was alone before he said anything. "Don't mention this to anyone will you...please" he added the last word in a whisper.

"Shame she had to be asleep...if she was awake then she probably would have healed all by herself just to be with you." Tails continued before sorting through his equipment and starting to set it up.

Sonic smiled at Tails before heading towards the kitchen to find Knuckles, trusting the kitsune. He found Knuckles shoving a mouthful of biscuits into his mouth, sitting on the table awaiting his arrival.

"Took your time, slow coach!" Knuckles shouted.

"You're calling me slow! You know what...never mind. Let's just go!" Sonic muttered before grabbing hold of the echidna and shouting "CHAOS CONTROL!"

They materialised in Eggman's base just a few seconds later and Sonic released his grip on Knuckles, immediately walking around and studying his surroundings. They were in one of the many corridors of Eggman's base, just as dull and boring as the rest.

"Which part of the base are we in?"Knuckles questioned whilst dusting crumbs off his red fur.

"I'm not sure...but" Sonic curled up into a ball and slammed into the nearest fire alarm. The entire corridor was bathed in a red light as the sirens blared up, alerting the enemy of their presence.

"That should do it" Sonic said triumphantly.

"Do what?" Knuckles asked genuinely confused as to why his friend had set off the alarm.

"Eggman's gonna search for where the alarm was activated. And when he does...he'll find us." Sonic stated. He was keeping watch on the corridors leading off from the one they were in, just in case any bots came down.

"FIRE...there can't be. Show the CCTV footage of the alarm activation." Eggman shouted across to his right hand robot. A video flashed onto the screen as Eggman's eyes widened.

"SONIC! How'd he get out...and where are the other two?" Eggman questioned himself before getting up and heading off to the left wing of the base, where Sonic was impatiently awaiting his arrival.

Eggman walked down the corridors, a small army of bots walking in synch behind him. He turned the last corner to find Sonic and Knuckles in offense positions, watching his every move closely. Eyes narrowed, prepared for any sort of attack that could be thrown at them.

"So you got out then. Where did you ditch the other two? Oh, right. I get it...one of them got hit with the syringe I fired. Am I right?" Eggman taunted and was answered by glares from both figures in front of him.

'_Obviously I hit a nerve' _

"I'll take that as a yes!" Eggman shouted, pride emanating from his voice.

"What are you two still doing here...shouldn't you be comforting you friend in their last hours on Mobius" Eggman sneered, a gleam of evil in his eyes.

Both Sonic and Knuckles growled in unison, quickly losing their patience with the scientist.

"Which one was it anyway, clever clogs or pinky?" Eggman asked, genuinely curious.

Sonic completely lost his patience and slammed the doctor right in the stomach, knocking him off his disproportional feet and crashing into the robots behind him. This caused a chain-reaction with all the robots falling like skittles with Eggman acting like a bowling ball.

In under a second Sonic had his fist in front of the doctor's face, snarling in disgust. Eggman's eyes widened in horror as he realised what Sonic was planning on doing.

"Why'd you have to stoop so low? Tell me what the poison was so we can reverse it." Sonic demanded, anger flaring in the back of his emerald eyes.

'_He sure is angry...and I'm pretty sure I know why!'_ Eggman's shock dissipated, only to be replaced with curiosity.

"Pinky got hurt did she. No wonder you're so feisty." Eggman taunted, wanting to push all of Sonic's buttons. Sonic just growled at him and pulled his fist back, aiming for the fat doctor's nose.

"WAIT!" Eggman screeched, fear noticeable in his voice. Sonic stopped mid punch, hovering over the mad man's face.

"I'll give you the antidote!" He shouted hurriedly as Sonic backed away from him. Knuckles had his arms crossed and was watching the drama unfold, ready to step in when his help was required.

Eggman stood up, dusted himself off and turned to face his nemesis Sonic. Sonic glared at the doctor, anger radiating around him.

"Give us the antidote then, doctor!" Sonic spat out the word 'doctor' like it was poison itself.

Eggman glanced at the duo in front of him before turning to face his bots. They were still toppled over, and struggling to stand.

'_Urgh, stupid things. I guess I could have some fun with this situation, I mean, Sonic can't exactly refuse' _

"On one condition, you have to do three challenges that I will set." Eggman said slyly, turning to face the heroes.

"But we need that antidote now!" Knuckles shouted, taking a step forward.

"Uh uh uh! Don't worry about mouthy. She'll be fine for the next forty-eight hours...it's after that you might want to start worrying about her." Eggman chuckled to himself, as he waggled his finger.

Knuckles just stared at the fat man before him in shock_. 'How can he play with someone's life like this, does he not have any sort of heart...I suppose this is Eggman we're dealing with'_

"We accept your stupid challenge!" Sonic shouted, receiving a nod from Knuckles direction.

'_I would do anything to make sure nothing happens to Amy...it's my fault she's where she is at the minute anyway.'_

"Very well. It's now 11:30pm, meet me at Emerald Lake in six hours time." Eggman said as he started walking through the fallen robots.

Sonic turned to Knuckles and saw that he was watching the doctor retreat. He was muttering things like 'worthless peices of junk' and 'why does he bother'. He noticed Sonic was looking at him and stopped.

"I think we should go." Sonic said, grabbing the emerald from his back and stretching out his arm towards Knuckles.

Knuckles nodded and grabbed hold of Sonic and they were gone in a familiar flash.

...xxx...

"TAILS!" Sonic shouted after emerging in his workshop.

"I'm in the living room." Tails shouted back, immediately recognising his older brother's voice.

Knuckles and Sonic entered the living room to find Amy sitting up on the sofa with Tails sat on the couch opposite, a monitor in his lap.

"AMY?" Both Sonic and Knuckles shouted at the same time, they stopped in their tracks confused.

"Tails did you find an antidote!" Sonic questioned with hope.

Tails shook his head. "Nope, she just keeps drifting in and out of consciousness. Did you guys find out anything?"

Sonic looked over at Amy who was mouthing 'thank you' to him and beaming widely, causing a small blush t form on his cheeks as Knuckles spoke.

"Eggman said he'll give it to us if we complete three challenges. We're meeting him at Emerald Lake in six hours Now if you guys will excuse me, I'm gonna get some sleep." Knuckles stated before heading off to rest next to the tree in front of Tails' house.

"But...Sonic, what about Amy? What if it's too late?" Tails asked worriedly, considering their options.

Amy had remained silent the whole time, but whimpered in fear when Tails mentioned them being too late. Sonic couldn't help but smile at her; he really couldn't resist her when she was scared and had puppy dog eyes. Luckily for him she hadn't figured that out just yet.

Sonic sat next to Amy and pulled her closer to himself, smiling down at her comfortingly.

"Eggman said she'd be fine for the next forty-eight hours. I'm pretty sure he wouldn't lie after coming this close to getting a punch on his ugly mug" Sonic said smugly before emphasising his point by putting together his forefinger and thumb.

Both Amy and Tails giggled for a moment before smiling at each other. Amy, who normally would have been ecstatic that Sonic was holding her so close to himself, slowly closed her eyes and fell into a deep sleep, her head resting lightly on his furry chest.

Sonic had to admit, he liked holding Amy close to him. She made him feel...feel...he really couldn't put into words _**what**_ he felt when he was with her. All he knew was that he liked it.

Sonic was snapped out of his thoughts as Tails spoke.

"So...what made you admit to being in love with Amy?"

Sonic heart instantly started beating faster, as he fumbled with words inside his head. He knew the question was coming...and now that the two were alone, Sonic had guessed it would only be a matter of time.

Sonic breathed in deeply. "Tails...I actually...don't know. I guess...I guess I always liked her; it just took that extra push for me to actually realize it. I've always felt drawn towards her, and I guess that's what made me run away from her to start with."

"Really? We always thought it was those bear hugs she gave you...although; she has stopped doing that hasn't she?"

Sonic nodded in agreement, as memories of Amy glomping him to the ground flashed before his eyes. How her eyes would glimmer so perfectly when she'd finally find him after he'd run away from her.

"So, uh...when you planning on telling her that you feel the same way about her, as she does about you?"

"I guess...right after we get the antidote I suppose. Why?" Sonic asked suspiciously, Tails wasn't normally one to ask so many questions. He normally knew all the answers.

"Oh, no reason. Just, you know, wondering is all" Tails hurriedly replied.

'_Okay...I know that cover up. I've used it enough times myself' _Sonic pondered.

"Okay Tails, what's up?"

"N-n-n-nothings up Sonic!" Tails stuttered, twiddling with his thumbs and avoiding his friends gaze.

"It's okay...I know exactly how you feel. How about you tell her when I tell Ames eh!" Sonic chuckled slightly, softly stroking Amy's soft quills.

Tails was overwhelmed with embarrassment; he didn't think that Sonic was going to click on so quickly. _'I guess once you've been through it, you can see it others...'_

"Get some rest Sonic. If you're gonna meet Eggman to face his challenge then he'll have the upper hand. You're gonna need all your strength and the chaos emerald to stand a chance of doing all three in time." Tails stated, his cheeks still glowing brightly.

Sonic looked down at Amy's sleeping form and nodded in approval. He slowly lifted her up and rested her head on the cushion. He took one last look at the sleeping beauty before him, he knew that whatever Eggman would throw at him...he'd overcome it just to see Amy's incredible smile again.

He waved goodbye to Tails and left the house. Jumping from the tree Knuckles was under, Sonic landed on the roof and lay down. The stars were twinkling, but Sonic was too zoned out to notice the beauty of the night, there was only one beauty on his mind at the time. She was pink, lovely...and currently in danger.

'_I am a hero after all...I guess now, I'm gonna have to prove how much she means to me. And nothing is gonna get in the way of me and saving the person that I value more than myself!' _

It was with these thoughts that he finally drifted off into a dreamless sleep.

...xxx...

Knuckles slowly stirred, as a cold breeze washed over him. Opening his eyes slightly, he saw a figure float down in front of him. It landed lightly and gazed at him, before turning to walk towards the house.

Curiosity got the better of Knuckles as he jumped out shouting 'Wait!'. The figure looked back and Knuckles felt a warm sensation as Rouge the bat came into view.

"Knux! What's going sweetie, Eggman tipped me off that Pinky's in trouble." Knuckles was quick to note the worry on her lovely face, illuminated by the moonlight.

"Yeah...it's his fault too. But, why are you so worried?" Knuckles asked accusingly.

"Knuckles! I may switch sides now and then but...that doesn't mean I don't consider you guys as friends."

Knuckles remained silent, trying to figure out the girl in front of him. Deciding that she was in fact being sincere, Knuckles explained the situation her. Rouge nodded now and then, paying full attention to what Knuckles had to say.

When Knuckles had finished he turned to look at the roof, a common resting place of his hedgehog friend. Sure enough, the blue blur was resting in his usual position, one leg slung over the other and his head resting lightly on top of his hands. Deciding that as soon as he was done with Rouge he'd have to somehow wake him up, Knuckles went through his options as to which method to use.

Rouge sighed, snapping Knuckles out of his thoughts. "Eggman's gone a little too far with his crazy schemes this time. He's probably wondering where I am right now so I'm going...but...if ya ever need any help, you know _**can**_ call me!"

Rouge winked before taking off into the diamond studded sky, leaving a red cheeked echidna in her wake.

...xxx...


	4. Emerald Lake

Sorry about the long wait for this chapter guys, I had a really busy week. But now that the holidays are here, I'll have more time to update, and hopefully I'll have some new stuff coming out too. ^_^

Thanks to SilverDawn2010, Lexi The Hedgehog, 01sonamy01, JazzTheHedgehogSingingStar and ShadowMaster193 for reviewing...xx

Emerald Lake

"OW!" Sonic shouted, jumping up from the roof. Sonic looked around him, everything seemed calm. A small pebble lay on the roof, next to where he was sleeping. Sonic picked it up and examined it, it looked like one the pebbles from the front of the house.

Walking over to the edge of roof, Sonic cautiously peered over the edge. There was Knuckles, holding something small in his hands. Sonic's eyes widened as he narrowly dodged a flying rock. Unfortunately, the quick manoeuvre caused him to lose his balance.

"Arrgh" Sonic screamed as he tumbled towards the ground, landing with a loud thump, mumbling something about 'stupid rock throwing idiots'.

"Uh...huh!" Knuckles chuckled nervously as Sonic peeled himself off the floor and glared at him.

"What, was that for?" Sonic asked annoyance clearly noticeable in his tone.

"We-ll...How else do you expect to wake you up when you're on the _roof_? I certainly wasn't gonna climb up _**there**_" Knuckles signalled to the top of the house. Sonic glared at the guy before him before turning to walk off.

"Sonic wait! Where are you going?" Knuckles shouted, following suit of the blue hedgie.

"Duh...Eggman's challenge! That _**is**_ why you woke me up in the first place isn't it?"

Knuckles nodded in response and both heroes started making their way to their first challenge. The cool morning breeze blowing into their fur as they slowly made their way to Emerald Lake.

...xxx...

The sparkling blue of the mystic lake shimmered as the first rays of sunlight bounced off the water, reflecting back into the sky, creating a glimmering and shining aura around the edges. One side of the lake was surrounded by vibrant evergreen trees as high as the sky itself. Sonic and Knuckles stood in a clearing, with a clear view of the lake and many of its surrounding areas.

Knuckles sat at the edge of the lake, skipping any stones he could find. Each bounce creating a constantly expanding circle on the surface of the water, as if trying to escape from the lake and drift out onto the land.

"Where's Eggy...I thought he'd be here hours ago. Setting up his challenge thing..." Knuckles cried out, finally tired of waiting for the moustached maniac.

Sonic was leaning against the trunk of the nearest tree, one leg carelessly slung over the other with his hands resting behind his head as usual. Knuckles on the other hand was now pacing up and down the clearing, anxiety evident by his expression.

"You can spend days on end watching a big rock, but you can't wait ten minutes for Egghead to show up!" Sonic muttered, opening one eye lazily to look at the echidna.

"I don't get it!" Knuckles shouted out in frustration

"No change there then, you usually..." Sonic was cut off as a log hurtled towards him and smashed to peices just above his head.

Both heroes watched in awe as the fragments of wood exploded in front of Sonic, miraculously avoiding him.

Sonic jumped up and eyed the place the log had been thrown from, going over to investigate Sonic found nothing.

As soon as he thought it was safe to do so, Sonic returned and stood next to Knuckles, observing the scattered flints of wood lying on the floor.

Amongst the bits of wood on the floor, lay a small metal walkie talkie. Knuckles made to reach down to pick it up but jumped back as he heard a voice ring out from it.

"This is it! Your first challenge...at Lake Emerald" Both Sonic and Knuckles s listened intently as Eggman's voice continued in its usual monotonous tone.

"Somewhere at the bottom of that lake are two teleporters. If you manage to find them before an hour is up then, once touched, the teleporter will transport the person to the second challenge. But if you don't find them within the hour...then you fail the challenge and the secret antidote will never be yours. Why an hour you say, because that's when I will shut them down you fools. Your time began when I started speaking."

Eggman laughed menacingly and the duo heard a faint beeping before the device exploded in a puff of smoke. Sonic stared at the broken machine lying on the ground before turning to face his buddy.

"So...you ready Knux?"

Both Sonic and Knuckles looked simultaneously out at the vast, deep and secluded lake. After a few moments of silence, Knuckles spoke.

"Well, good luck buddy. Eggman really knows how to make something hard for you doesn't he. First Amy and now..._**water**_" Knuckles patted Sonic on the back reassuringly.

Sonic's eyes misted over as he continued to glare at the menacing water in front of him, moving swiftly as if trying to taunt him further.

"You can do it buddy...now, if you don't mind. I've got a teleporter to find, as have you!" Knuckles finished before diving head first into the deep lake.

Sonic watched as the water bobbed about where Knuckles had jumped in, and then slowly return to how it was before. He walked up to the edge of the lake and stared down into its blue and green depths, swirling in a mass of colours.

'_It's just a bit of water...okay so maybe it's __**a lot**__ of water...but so what if I drown and die, she's worth dying for...but if I don't find the teleporter, then she'll be the one who dies...I can't let that happen'_

Sonic made to jump, moving forward and edging silently closer towards the water. He let one foot waver above the water, hovering so close that he was sure he could already feel some water seep through his precious sneakers.

'_C'mon Sonic, you're halfway there. Now all you have to do is dunk it in, then follow after it.'_ Sonic re-angled his foot so that the tip of his foot dipped slightly into the clear substance. He felt his toes being consumed in water and quickly retracted, shaking his foot violently.

'_Nope, not going in. Never gonna happen. I'm sure Knuckles can find both the teleporters and manage to get one to me up here...somewhere?' _Sonic frowned as he turned back to the lake, the red echidna had resurfaced and was looking at Sonic as if to say 'why aren't you in yet?'. Sonic shook his head at the echidna.

"Sonic, the water isn't gonna kill you. But Eggman's gonna kill Amy if you don't be quick about it!" Knuckles shouted, hoping that Sonic would realise that he couldn't let a fear get between their mission. Especially if it was such a serious one, with a life at stake.

He watched the hedgehog twiddle his thumbs, and look at the water as if it was about to eat him. "SONIC HURRY UP!" Knuckles had lost all patience with the hedgehog.

"Just...just give me a minute kay?" Sonic muttered, biting his lip. Knuckles shook his head, before returning to the underwater landscape below.

Sonic breathed in deeply. _'Water can't hurt me...C'mon, I'm Sonic the Hedgehog. There's tons of bad guys out there who are afraid of me. I'm a hero...yet I'm afraid of water. But not anymore...no, this hedgehog is breaking out of the phobia...even if it is only for hour. Okay, this is it! Charge?' _

Without a second thought to change his mind, Sonic spin dashed towards the lake and plunged into the icy cold water. It took him a moment to register what he had just done. Flailing about like a mad fish, Sonic realised that he wasn't actually sinking, but was just subtended in the water. Looking from left to right, Sonic swam to the surface as fast as he could, taking care to hold his breath the whole time, the water clinging to his fur and slowing him down.

He broke the surface in a matter of seconds, inhaling a gulp of fresh air as soon as he was certain he was out. In the distance he saw the water shift as a drenched echidna came up for air. Knuckles gave Sonic a thumbs up before disappearing beneath the water once again.

Sonic felt the water lap up against his figure and winced slightly at the cold wetness of it. The water felt disgusting and to him, and very uninviting. The young hedgehog was at a loss for reasons why people actually _**liked**_ it.

He pushed aside all his fears and hatred of water and concentrated on what really mattered...Amy. He knew that everything he was doing was for her safety. She was in trouble because he had decided to go against his instincts, and it was up to him to save her. And after this all this was over, maybe...just maybe, he'd get to give her the happy ending she'd always wanted.

With these thoughts flowing through his mind, Sonic held his breath and swam downwards. Kicking his legs frantically and squinting to see through the white froth the motion caused, Sonic reached the bottom of the lake in about ten seconds flat.

Looking around him, Sonic found the water was just as clear as it looked from the surface. Rocks were strewn across the lake floor, shimmering as the newborn rays of light reflected of them. Sonic swam along the floor, searching for a metallic glint of any sort.

Occasionally, something would flash in the corner of the hedgehog's eye, but every time he turned to see what it was, he'd find a shoal of fish swimming past or he'd find that he'd just imagined it.

After thirty minutes of searching, both Knuckles and Sonic met above the water at the same time.

"SONIC!" Knuckles shouted whilst swimming over to his friend. "You found anything yet?"

"Not yet...we got twenty-five minutes left or we fail the challenge. If you find a teleporter, take it and don't wait up. We have to do this challenge." Sonic replied before again returning to the watery depths below.

Swimming all the way down, Sonic examined all the rocks and cracks in the floor. Every now and then a bubble would escape his lips out of frustration. The hedgehog continued his search in hope.

Just as Sonic was about to meet with Knuckles to ask if maybe searching together they'd have more luck, a faint pink glow caught his eye. Sonic turned and swam to where he guessed it had come from.

The pink light strengthened as Sonic neared and he found that it was emanating from a crack in the lake floor. Sonic reached into the crevice and fumbled around, searching for anything that could be responsible for the light. His hand closed around something warm and welcoming. He pulled his hand out of the crack, still clutching the item and stared down at his hand in disbelief.

There in his hand sat a fuchsia chaos emerald. Sonic swam to the surface to examine the emerald properly and check that it wasn't just a fake.

He broke the surface soon after, the emerald clenched between both hands. He closed his eyes and emptied his mind, which was easier said than done. Getting Amy off his mind was extremely hard, since she had been the only thing on his mind for the past day.

'_Okay...empty mind. Not working at the minute!...' _

He eventually managed it and looked into the inky blackness, straining his mind to find some sort of light.

There, before his closed eyes, the emerald floated in mid air while in actual fact it was still clenched tightly between his gloved hands.

'_It's genuine? But...what was it doing down there...and how come Eggman didn't detect it when he was laying out his trap?' _Full of questions, Sonic called out for Knuckles. When he received no answer and the echidna had not resurfaced Sonic shouted out to him once again.

Sonic looked around...still no Knuckles. He waited a few more seconds, still calling out to his friend. Sonic then started getting worried, as thoughts of the worst outcomes clouded his thoughts..

Just as Sonic was considering going back under and searching for him, he saw a bright light consume the far end of the lake. Sonic breathed out deeply as relief washed over him.

'_Good. He found a teleporter; now all I have to do is find the other one'_ Sonic thought to himself.

He looked at the emerald in his hand one last time before storing it in his back quills until needed. He then set about figuring out where the second transporter would be.

'_Eggman's not the brightest tool in the box. If he placed a teleporter at one end of the lake, chances are the other ones on directly the opposite side of the lake.'_ Sonic thought, pleased he had drawn out such an obvious conclusion.

He swam to the opposite side of the lake from where the light had come from. _'Well...here goes nothing?'_

Sonic breathed in deeply and dived under. He swam straight down, his eyes trained in finding a glint of silver. He searched left and right, occasionally shoving rocks out of the way to check underneath them.

The rocky landscape obscured his vision of what was behind, so Sonic had to swim around things to get a clearer view.

Just as he was about to go up for air, he saw it. A round metal object, with the Eggman insignia engraved in the centre of the circle. Sonic swam as fast as his arms and legs would allow him and clutched at the object with all his might.

As soon as his gloved hands touched the device, Sonic was shrouded in a bright white light, his vision impaired. He felt as if a thousand winds were blowing at him, wanting him to release the object, but Sonic clutched to it with all his might, willing himself to not let go no matter what. After what felt like hours, the winds died down and Sonic's feet hit hard ground.

Sonic fell limply to the ground; he took a deep breath and relaxed a little. Opening his eyes, he found Knuckles waving his hand in front of his face.

"You okay Sonic. You look like a drenched rat." Knuckles said observantly.

"You don't look so good yourself, Knux" Sonic replied huskily. "Where are we?" he questioned. Sonic stood up and shivered as he felt the wet substance on him.

"Some kind of warehouse or storeroom or something. It belongs to Eggman though." Knuckles answered, pointing to the various insignia's in the room.

Sonic looked around him, and sure enough, there were hundreds of Eggbots. All lined up neatly in rows, none of them functioning at the time. Each Eggbot was red with a yellow Eggman insignia on their chest.

Sonic stared around him, eyes wide with shock. He glanced nervously at Knuckles who just returned a confused expression.

"We're not gonna have to beat all this lot are we?" Sonic questioned worriedly, knowing full well they didn't have any time to waste.

...xxx...

"How on Mobius did those two losers find both of the teleporters? Hmphh!" Eggman stared wide eyed at his computer screen, currently showing CCTV footage of Eggman's latest warehouse.

He had been hoping that they would both fail the first challenge and he wouldn't have to put the other two into action. It sure would save him the trouble.

Eggman grimaced and whispered evilly to himself. "I guess I'll just have to put plan B into operation sooner than I thought I would." He slowly pressed an orange button on his keyboard, savouring the moment as he knew exactly what the outcome would be.

He then turned to his microphone, ready to address the echidna and hedgehog, both of whom were anxiously awaiting their next challenge.

...xxx...


	5. Hidden Room

Thanks to SilverDawn2010 and JazzTheHedgehogSingingStar for reviewing...xx

I edited the last chapter, so the Sonic diving scene now has a lot more detail than it did before, as SilverDawn2010 kindly pointed out that it would be a lot harder for him to jump into water. So you can go back and check it out, it's up to you.

And I truly am sorry for the humongous wait. I've just been so busy. But I'm back now, and I have a lot of stories to catch up on! Anyways, enjoy...xx

Hidden Room

The large warehouse was just like any other of Eggman's warehouses. Roughly rectangular shaped, with robots lining the space inside. The walls were a dull off-white shade, with almost every wall bearing Eggman's trademark someplace or other, and a strange metallic smell lingered no matter how much you tried to get away from it.

Sonic and Knuckles both eyed the robots in the room warily, as if they would attack them at any second. As soon as they were sure that none of them were about to attack them or anything similar, they lowered their guard slightly.

A click sounded from the various speakers situated at the top corners of the room, and Eggman's annoying voice rang out, echoing throughout the warehouse.

"_So, you made it through the first challenge then. I have to say, I'm impressed Sonic. Especially with you jumping into the water the way you did. I didn't think you had it in you!"_ Eggman sneered.

Sonic snarled as he and Knuckles regained their attack positions, expecting an attack any second. "Just cut to the chase Egghead! What's the challenge?" Sonic shouted, quickly growing tired of Eggman's taunts.

"_Well, since you seem in a bit of a hurry. Not that I would know why, since you __**claim **__she's not your girlfriend. As you can see, this is one of my many magnificent warehouses. This particular one houses a thousand Eggbots. Within one of these Eggbots is the key to the next teleporter which is located at the centre of the room. I'll leave you find out which one it's in though."_ Eggman laughed menacingly before shutting down the mic with another resounding click.

Knuckles looked at Sonic sceptically. "Are we gonna have to crack open each one of these robots?"

Sonic glanced around him nervously, "Looks that way, doesn't it...it's just that, this could take hours and we need to save Ames as quick as possible!"

Knuckles shrugged. "We may as well start." He punched the robot closest to him, and watched as it fell to the floor in peices. He quickly shuffled through the pile left, finding nothing more than robot parts.

"Well...we know it's not that one. How long have you been calling Amy, Ames anyways?" Knuckles questioned whilst smashing another bot into smithereens, trying to make some sort of conversion.

Sonic bit his lip in an attempt to come up with an answer. "I don't actually know...anyway, that's not important right now. We should just concentrate on finding that key."

Sonic continued looking around the room, trying to find anything out of the ordinary. In the centre of the room sat a big teleporter. It was a large disc shaped thing, with a standing platform in the middle. A key shaped hole was fixed firmly in place on the stand, next to the stairs leading to the centre.

'_The key's for the teleporter...so if I was Eggman, which I'm __**so **__glad I'm not, then I would give my enemies a slight chance at accomplishing any challenge I set, no matter how small. So, I don't think he was lying about the key being in a robot.'_

Sonic looked around at the rest of the room. All the bots were arranged neatly in rows, there were forty rows of twenty-five. Each robots eyes blank and emotionless, staring dead ahead into space aimlessly.

'_Okay, so Eggbutt was right about the thousand bots. But he must have marked the one with key somehow. Otherwise even __**he**__ wouldn't know which one it was in.' _Sonic exhaled deeply.He scratched the back of his head in confusion, staring blankly at a robot occupied corner of the room. Sonic found himself thinking hard, just like his little brother would if he was in the same situation and surprised himself a little.

'_Guess Tails rubbed off on me...well he is super smart so I suppose that's a good thing' _Sonic shook his head to clear his thoughts.

"SONIC!"

Sonic snapped out of his little trance and looked at his friend, fearing the worst. He found Knuckles eyeing him curiously.

"Dude, you're wasting time just standing there. Break these dumbots and help find the key." Knuckles said, frustrated that despite the urgency of the mission Sonic was still not paying full attention.

'_I thought after diving into water of all things, he would at least be more...more helpful!'_

"No Knuckles, I'm not wasting my time...in fact, I think I just figured out something that will help us find the key." Sonic replied calmly.

Knuckles looked at Sonic, confusion plastered all over his face. Sonic pointed to the corner of the room he was staring at a minute back. "Look over there!"

"Uh, Sonic...I don't see anything but Eggman's bots." Knuckles replied, even more confused.

"Look_, right_ there. There's a gap between the two robots." Sonic stated proudly.

"And...That's important because?" Knuckles was starting to think Sonic was slowly losing it.

Sonic rolled his eyes and huffed loudly before continuing. "The robots in this place are all organised into neat rows and columns. Times the rows by the columns and you get one thousand. But if there's a gap it means ones missing. I'm betting that that Eggman's hidden it somewhere. And if we find where he's hidden that one, we find the key."

"You mean that there were only nine hundred and ninety nine of these things when we came in the first place!" Knuckles shouted incredulously.

"Yup" Sonic replied, a half smile on his face.

"But the one with the key could be anywhere!" Knuckles continued shouting.

"Nope, not _anywhere_. Eggman may be evil, but even he doesn't set an impossible challenge. My guess is that it's hidden around this warehouse, away from all the other drones." Sonic continued.

'_Now the only thing left to do is figure out where...' _Sonic thought to himself.

"How do you expect us to find it then?" Knuckles had now stopped shouting, but kept his fists clenched.

"I'm gonna call Tails, and check up on him and Amy. You start looking around for any hollow walls or secret tunnels." Sonic instructed.

Knuckles merely nodded his head in acknowledgement before running off to the nearest wall and tapping hastily on it. A hard, blunt sound resounded, signalling Knuckles to move onto another section of the wall.

'_Okay...so that's finding the key on the way. Now I just gotta contact Tails to see how Ames is doing. I hope she's okay...'_

Sonic started tapping on his wristwatch, trying to get a hold of his younger fox brother. Sonic pressed the dial button and waited. After getting no response, not even a dialling tone, he tried again.

'_That's weird...I can't seem to get a signal in here. It must be the walls, or the base is underground.' _Sonic thought, before running back up to Knuckles.

Knuckles stopped what he was doing to look at the azure hedgehog with a worried expression."That was a quick call, is everything okay?" Knuckles questioned.

"I dunno, I can't get a signal from here. I'll try again in a bit. In the meantime, we've got a key to find." Sonic grinned at Knuckles before speeding off to the other side of the room.

Sonic put his ear against the wall, trying to hear the sound of wind or air on the other side. _'Tails must have put some sort of building map planner into this thing' _Sonic thought, desperately banging buttons on his wristwatch.

"Wait...it has voice recognition commands...I can be such an idiot!" Sonic thought out loud whilst pressing the voice button on the communicator.

The wrist watch made a series of beeping noises in response, accompanied by a small flashing light.

"Okay watch thing...draw a plan of this area." Sonic instructed hopefully.

"_SODAR scanning initiated...preparing image...image completed"_ The dull, monotonous voice seeped out from the watch.

"Alright! Knux, get over here!" Sonic shouted, pumping his fist in the air.

Knuckles turned to where Sonic was stood, before heading over to him as quickly as he could. "What'd you find Sonic?" Knuckles voiced impatiently.

"A picture plan of the base...and according to this, there's a secret room... in the wall over there." Sonic said, pointing to the wall to his left.

At inspecting the wall more closely, both the heroes could make out the small outline of a hole that had been filled up.

"Why that sneaky lunatic...playing dirty isn't gonna help him win!" Knuckles shouted, angered by the fact that Eggman wasn't playing fair.

Sonic ran over to the wall with the secret room, with Knuckles in hot pursuit. After studying it for a moment, Sonic started punching the wall in an attempt to break it. Knuckles joined in almost immediately.

Knuckles realised that their meek punches weren't doing much, so he walked a couple of metres away from the wall. He charged at the wall with a cry of "Sonic move!" placed a hard punch into the wall, using his momentum and anger to power and fuel the blow.

Knuckles stood back and examined the crack he had made. "The walls gonna be the weakest here, do you think you can spin dash it?"

Sonic nodded, as he curled up into a blue ball and aimed a powerful blow at the crack. The hedgehog bounced straight back, the crack barely even touched. Sonic tried spin dashing again but bounced back once again.

"Eggman's done something to the wall, my spin dash won't work." Sonic looked confused as Knuckles once again charged at the crack. This time his fist when all the way through, causing some of the surrounded rock to crumble to dust. Knuckles, grunted as he pulled his hand out the freshly made hole, panting heavily.

"Nice going Knux! Who knew your anger could ever come in useful." Sonic grinned at Knuckles, giving him his trademark thumbs up which was met with an angry snarl.

Before Knuckles could do anything more, Sonic curled up into a blue ball and jumped through the hole to safety just narrowly avoiding Knuckles fist in the process.

Knuckles followed, muttering and cursing under his breath about a 'stupid blue hedgehog' and 'I'll show him anger'.

They were greeted with a lone robot that stood in the centre of the room, a dozen lasers placed on the walls to protect it. Each one glinting menacingly as the red motion sensors on the top flashed.

"They can't be good..." Sonic mused, looking at the lasers.

"No duh genius...!" Knuckles retorted, with a smirk on his face. He picked up a piece of rubble from the hole and threw it near the robot.

The lasers immediately activated, and the rock was hit with twelve beams of hot light. This lasted only a few seconds before they shut off again, the motion sensors once again flashing.

"I guess that speed is of the essence here." Sonic slowly edged his way across the walls to the opposite side of the small room so that he was directly facing Knuckles.

"Knuckles...wait outside, I'm gonna grab it and make a run for it. But I'm gonna have to go _really_ fast."

"Right" Knuckles replied as he made his way to the hole and climbed back into the main warehouse.

Sonic braced himself; he knew that as soon as he got anywhere near the robot the lasers would start shooting mercilessly. To have even the slightest chance of avoiding them he would have to go a lot faster than his usual speed.

Sonic slowly revved his legs up, gradually increasing his speed. He mustered as much energy as he could and used it to power his legs to go faster and faster. His legs were nothing but a swirl of blue as he powered up, ready for what could be one of the fastest runs of his life.

The power built up and up and Sonic let it run free throughout his body. In a burst of speed, Sonic sped straight towards the robot, rushing past it at a furious pace. He used his outstretched hand to grab a hold of the robots arm and dragged it out of the room with him, leaving nothing but a blue streak behind him.

The lasers flashed into action, but unfortunately for them their bounty had already been taken. Sonic landed with a thump on the cold floor, the robot collapsing in a heap next to him. He could hear the lasers firing in the background and his breath came out in short bursts.

He turned his head slightly to find Knuckles breaking the Eggbot and rummaging through the metal. Sonic pushed himself off the ground and walked over to the pieces of metal. He grinned as Knuckles found the key.

The small golden object looked immaculate in the Echidnas strong hands. They both looked at bumped fists. They ran over to the teleporter, Knuckles fumbled whilst trying to get key into the slot.

He got it eventually and the machine flew into life. A vast array of lights blared out from the machine and danced on the walls whilst the pair climbed on to it and Sonic pressed the red button.

Once again both heroes vision was covered in a blinding white light and they felt a strange sensation of another worldly wind blow through them. This time though it didn't feel like it wanted them to get off. To Sonic it almost seemed like the wind was urging him to stay on the platform, willing him to complete his mission.

The feeling passed as quickly as it had come and the white faded to reveal a small roman style arena with the two heroes at one side of it.


	6. The Final Shock

Thanks to 01sonamy01, kizzie, XoxoSonamy4440oxoX and Infinity Jazz Star Hedgehog! You guys are awesome.

I have updated the last chapter and added as much detail as I could to the part where Sonic grabs the robot and runs. Check it out if you can. And without further ado, behold chapter six!

The Final Shock

_Once again both heroes vision was covered in a blinding white light and they felt a strange sensation of another worldly wind blow through them. This time though it didn't feel like it wanted them to get off. To Sonic it almost seemed like the wind was urging him to stay on the platform, willing him to complete his mission._

_The feeling passed as quickly as it had come and the white faded to reveal a small roman style arena with the two heroes at one side of it. _

As both Sonic and Knuckles stepped off the machine, it slowly sunk into the dirt beneath their feet. Neither bothered to check where it had gone, they were too absorbed in their surroundings to even notice that it had disappeared.

The room looked exactly like a traditional coliseum, round in shape with audience seats around the edge. In the middle was a sandy playing field, and a few pillars were dotted around the outside to complete the effect. The whole place had an old and fragile feel to it, and a musty smell to go.

After what felt like hours of gazing at the marvellous structure surrounding them, both Sonic and Knuckles tore their eyes away from the arena. Eggman floated about in his Eggmobile to the centre of the stadium, eyes gleaming maliciously he pushed a button on his keyboard.

A great rumbling echoed around the stadium and shook the very ground that the heroes stood on. On the far side of the room, the dirt was forced up as a great structure uncovered itself. A couple of seconds later, the whole thing had emerged, and with gleaming red eyes stared at the heroes.

It was another one of Eggman's robots, but this one had a slightly different feel to it. It was a giant lion constructed solely of a gold coloured metal. Its eyes were made from some sort of red rock and were very effective at distracting its target.

"Well, well, well! Look what the cat dragged in." Eggman laughed menacingly, while his robot walked in circles around its prey.

Eggman received glares from Sonic and Knuckles, both of who had assumed the fighting position.

"What? You don't find my little joke funny...you hero types have no sense of humour." Eggman was once again greeted with a forced silence.

"So you found out about my little trick...I knew you would get it at some point." Eggman sneered as a twisted smile played about his lips.

Sonic narrowed his eyes at Eggman and risked a glance at Knuckles who was cracking his namesakes impatiently. Both heroes tried to keep their eyes on the robot cat who was still circling them.

"Sonic, I've never seen you so quiet in my life. You always have some cocky remark to come back at me with!" Eggman eyed Sonic hopefully, just egging him for a retort.

'_Trust me; I have about a gazillion things to say to you. But then you might not hand over the antidote ' _

"I just don't feel like saying anything!" Sonic replied, his eyes never leaving the crimson red of his opponents.

"Since neither of you seem in any mood to talk...welcome to your third challenge. In this you will have to successfully destroy my Eggcat, but I'm sure that this is one challenge that even you, Sonic, will not be able to overcome." Eggman continued.

'_What is this dud playing at...he knows as well as I do that me and Knux could beat that thing without getting too battered up. There's gotta be some sort of catch to this._' Sonic thought to himself.

"As you can see, I designed it especially so that it would fit in with its surroundings. I mean, every coliseum needs its fair share of lions! And now, without further ado..." Eggman eyes narrowed evilly. "...Attack them Eggcat...and take no prisoners!"

With that said, Eggman floated off to another part of the stadium. One where he wasn't in danger of getting struck by a hedgehog, cat or echidna.

The robotic lion stopped circling the duo immediately and got ready to pounce.

"Good luck buddy!" Sonic shouted over to his friend. Knuckles nodded in recognition and the two charged into the big cat, slamming punches and spin dashing the metal as hard and fast as they could.

The Eggcat in return swiped at them with giant metal claws, kicking violently in the process. Both heroes dodged every attack and tried forming a plan, but with the constant distraction of getting crushed they were unable to.

'_He swipes with his two front paws...and kicks with the back two...'_ Sonic dashed out the way of as the cat pounded the ground where he was no more than a second earlier.

'_This is definitely going to be harder than I first thought. We need to buy some time...'_ Sonic thought, yet again moving out of harms way.

"Knuckles! Get to the other side of the arena as fast as you can!" Sonic shouted before heading there himself.

Sonic skid to a halt once reaching his destination with dirt flying up in every direction, showering the blue hedgehog with grains of sand and creating a small cloud of dust.

Sonic shook himself to rid himself of the sand when he caught sight of his brother, Tails, running towards him.

"Tails?" Sonic shouted incredulously, as Tails propelled himself with his tails as fast as he could. Tails reached the hedgehog at the same time as the echidna and both stared at him wide-eyed.

"Tails what are you doing here? How did you even get here?" Sonic blurted at the sight of his brother.

"It doesn't matter at the minute. The only important thing is that..." Tails was cut short as the lion came pounding towards the trio and they split.

Sonic only had time to hear part of Tails next sentence, 'I've lost...'

'_What could have Tails lost? Maybe it's his communicator, which would explain why I couldn't get through to him earlier!'_ Sonic scrambled out the way, only now noticing that the robotic cat had managed to sneak up on him.

Tails had run to the other side of the stadium and was fiddling with something on his wrist. _'He's got his communicator, so what could he have lost...I don't have time to think at the minute.'_

"SONIC!" Tails shouted, waving his arms frantically. "Sonic, aim for the head...the metal there is the weakest and that's where the control panel is!"

Sonic nodded his head to signify that he had heard his little brother and Tails next turned to informing Knuckles.

'_Not that I'm complaining, but what's Tails doing here...I'll ask him as soon as I've taken care of this 'Eggcat'. Seriously, that man needs to come up with some more imaginative names'_ Sonic thought whilst rolling his eyes. He focused on a spot on the cats head and sped off.

Meanwhile Tails had managed to get Knuckles attention. At first Knuckles had tried to ignore him and just focus solely on the task at hand. But curiosity had gotten the better of him and he turned to see where Tails' voice had come from. He found him at the side of the stadium waving like there was no tomorrow.

Whilst Knuckles was trying to decipher what his friend was saying, he let his guard down and was struck hard on the side by the lion's metal claw. He was flung helplessly into the wall, falling limply onto the floor. He could just make out an orange blur approaching him before his eyelids shut and everything went black.

Sonic, who had seen the whole thing, growled angrily and curled up into a tight ball before slamming into the cat's forehead with as much force as he muster at the time.

His anger fuelled his movement and he continued spin dashing the creature's head until he had made some sort of a dent. Sonic backed away to gather some of his remaining energy. The robotic lion took its chance and swiped at Sonic, sending him flying into the wall. Sonic fell to the floor with a hard thump and he felt something sharp dig into his back.

Sonic rolled onto his belly to remove the culprit. He reached into his back quills and was surprised as two emeralds emerged in his hand. The pink and red emerald lay in his hand, the latter shining with power.

'_I completely forgot about these two. The red one shining because I'm angry that I can't break the bot and save the girl I love! This thing gave Metal extra power when I was angry at him...maybe it can do the same thing for me?'_ Sonic thought. _'Can't hurt to try'_

He stuffed the pink one back into his quills and pressed his hands shut around the red one. Sonic shut his eyes and felt the emeralds power course through his veins. After a few seconds, his eyes flew open and locked onto his target. The robotic lion.

Sonic revved up and spin dashed straight towards the cat's forehead, using the power of the emerald to charge his speed further. Sonic was nothing more than a blue blur as he headed to his target.

The impact was so hard that Sonic emerged from the other side, creating a hole through the big cat's head. The crackling of electricity could be heard as the cat powered down and fell slowly to the floor.

A loud rumble could be heard as the giant machine came tumbling to the ground at high speed. As it hit the ground, it sent up all the dirt and sand around it creating a dusty fog around the arena.

Sonic coughed as the dirt got caught in his throat. In the distance, he could just about make out Tails dragging an unconscious Knuckles to safety of the stands that surrounded the arena.

Sonic made to go to his friends but was struck hard on the side. He fell to the floor in pain, clutching his side in pain. Sonic slowly stood up to get a good look at his attacker, blocking out all the pain he endured by the action.

Through the dusty fog, he could just make out the silhouette of a hedgehog loom in front of him. They had their fists poised in attack position, and were slowly edging cautiously closer to the azure hero.

'_Urgh...Is that Metal again? How many times is that dude gonna get rebuilt until Eggman finally realises that Metal is just as useless as all his other robots.' _

A pair of golden yellow eyes met Sonic's own forest green ones, and Sonic was sure he found them slightly familiar. But as the light shone over the figure, Sonic's eyes widened in shock and his lips could only form one word.

"Amy...?"


	7. Amy?

Thanks to Infinity Jazz Star Hedgehog, 01sonamy01 and WillowBelle for reviewing...xx ^_^

Amy...?

_A pair of golden yellow eyes met Sonic's own green ones, and Sonic was sure he found them slightly familiar. But as the light shone over the figure, Sonic's eyes widened in shock and his lips could only form one word._

"_Amy...?"_

Sonic stood wide eyed still clutching his side, his mouth repeating the same word over and over in disbelief. Being in such a shocked state, he didn't realise Amy had punched him in the stomach until it was too late; his legs buckled beneath him and he once again fell onto his knees in pain.

The punch however had snapped him into his senses and he rolled to the side to avoid her next attack; a hammer swing that would have smashed him to pieces.

Sonic looked up at Amy hopefully, her golden eyes devoid of emotion. _'Amy? What's going on with you?' _He quickly pushed himself off the dirt and ran towards Tails before Amy could do any more damage to him.

Glancing backwards in shock, Sonic felt something strange prick the back of his eyes. He shut his eyes tightly until the sensation passed, still running for his life.

He reached Tails pretty quickly and started firing questions at him. Tails was still trying to revive Knuckles, who was now mumbling indistinctly. A couple of seconds later, he started rubbing his eyes drowsily; when Knuckles was back on his feet Tails turned to face his older brother.

"Tails...What's going on with Amy? Why is she ...why is she attacking me? And why...her eyes, their gold?" Sonic rambled on until he was silenced by the arrival of Eggman.

"Yoo-hoo!" Eggman waved gleefully towards the trio, before floating closer to them so he wouldn't have to raise his voice to talk loudly.

'_Eggman...he must have something to do with Ames turning against me...he is so gonna get his butt kicked'_

"Do you like my little surprise, _Sonikku_" Eggman taunted, laughing maniacally, his head tilted backwards in victory.

Tails gripped Sonic's wrist with all the force he could muster to hold him back, the only thing refraining Sonic from destroying Eggman on the spot.

"We have to find out what he knows..." Tails whispered, just loud enough for Sonic's highly trained ears to pick up.

Sonic looked back at where he had left Amy, literally in his dust. She was still stood in the same place, swinging her hammer round in her hands.

"Don't worry about her; she won't be going anywhere until I tell her to!"

Sonic whipped his head back round and glared daggers at Eggman.

'_The evil idiot does have something to do with it...If he didn't hold all the answers I would...'_

"Eggman, talk quick...I haven't got the patience for a long speech right now!" Sonic snarled.

"Oh, what's wrong Sonic? Upset that your girlfriends turned on you?" Eggman continued.

Sonic breathed in and out slowly, trying as hard as he could to keep his anger from seething out of him.

'_I can't let the other side of me take over...I still haven't figured out how to control it'_

"Okay Eggman. What have you done to her?" Sonic asked, surprised at how calm his voice sounded.

'_He seems surprisingly level-headed for the situation _'Eggman mused, eyeing the hedgehog before him. _'Could it be that I made a mistake in thinking he had feelings for pinky. Either way, it won't matter because Sonic wouldn't hit one of his friends. It's a win-win situation, well, for me anyway.'_

"Once I found out that you'd found both the teleporters in the lake, I knew that the rest of the challenges would be a synch for you. And so being the genius I am, I initiated plan B." Eggman ranted.

"Plan B?" Sonic asked questioningly.

"You remember that poison Amy got injected with. Well, with the right signal it doubles as a mind control serum, but they can't both be used at the same time. So I sent out the signal for it to change form, and from that moment onwards she was my minion. When I found out it was her that got hit, I knew that the next time we faced off would be your downfall" Eggman laughed evily.

"Tails...why didn't you tell me when it happened?" Sonic shouted, angry that his buddy hadn't told him what was going on with Amy.

"I tried to, I really did but something was blocking all the transmissions!" Tails replied in a defensive manner, now releasing the grip on his brother.

"That would be me!" Eggman cut in. "I wanted it to be a..._surprise_! As soon as you destroyed my Eggcat I deactivated the transmission blocker, no use in wasting power. Now, if you'll excuse me I have to get _this_ to a safe hiding place." Eggman held up a bottle of purple liquid.

Sonic's eyes widened, _'That has to be the antidote'_. Something grabbed Sonic's arms from behind, he tried to move but found he couldn't. He turned his head slightly and was met by a flash of pink.

'_I've got you this time Sonic the hedgehog. You won't lay a finger on your precious Amy Rose' _Eggman thought to himself.

"_Always_ watch your back hedgehog. You never can believe an evil genius. Destroy him!" Eggman said commandingly before flying off.

Sonic squirmed trying to free himself, but it was useless; the girls grip was too tight. "Tails, help me out. But...don't hurt her!"

Tail's took the opportunity and threw dust into Amy's face causing her to release Sonic and remove the dirt from her head. Sonic slipped out of her grip without much effort and regained his position with Tails.

"Thanks buddy! What are we gonna do...we don't even know how to change her back!" Sonic shouted whilst avoiding an angry Amy.

Knuckles was pressing buttons on the wrist communicator and Tail's hovered above the ground scratching the back of his head in confusion.

"I don't know Sonic...I really have no idea!" Tails said, defeated at what to do next. Sonic dodged to the side as yet again a punch narrowly missed him.

"Tails...what about the chaos emerald?" Knuckles shouted, turning away from his communicator.

"Yeah but we only have one...and it's the red one. Well, I suppose Sonic is angry but that won't work against the one person he loves the most!" Tails shouted back, now even more at a loss.

Sonic was now hopping from one foot to the other as Amy swung her hammer at his legs. As soon as his way was clear he ran a good distance away from her before turning around to face her.

'_I have to get her to try and remember...'_

"Ames! Will you stop it, you're one of my best friends, and I know you're still in there...somewhere." he jumped into the air as once again Amy swiped at his legs. "You're strong enough to fight Eggman, and I know you can be strong enough to fight yourself!"

Sonic ran even further away from the quickly advancing Amy. _'If she refuses to remember anything then I guess I'm gonna have to force her to.'_

Sonic did a one-eighty turn and ran straight towards Amy, as he ran past her he grabbed her by the waist. He ran to the edge of the arena and pinned her against the wall so she couldn't move or fight back.

"AMY...will you listen to me. This isn't you! Eggman's controlling you, you have to fight him off...for you, for everyone and..._for me_..." At the last words Sonic let go of her and took a step back, hoping beyond hope that she was back to normal.

Sonic could have sworn he'd seen her eyes flash green, even if it was briefly. He was too busy focusing her eyes, he didn't see her swing her leg round and trip him up. Sonic went flying to the ground face first, gaining a mouthful of sand. He spit it out and rolled over as fast as he could.

Lifting his head slightly, Sonic gazed into Amy's golden eyes, a void of emptiness, staring down at him. He felt something poke him in the back once again and stood up with a new energy.

Sonic ran over to Tails, pulling two emeralds from his back. From his hand emanated a faint pink and red glow.

'_Why do I keep forgetting I have these...?' _Sonic mentally kicked himself; he had gotten enough real kicks from Amy.

"Tails! We haven't got one emerald, we've got two...I found the pink one at the bottom of Emerald Lake." Sonic said breathlessly. "Man that girl can kick!" Sonic muttered rubbing his leg.

"The fuchsia emerald..." Tails whispered in awe, taking the gem from his brother.

"Yeah, yeah...we can all have fun using fancy words like that when were done here..." Sonic muttered.

"No. Sonic. You don't get it!" Tails said, his eyes never leaving the emerald.

"Don't get what Tails, can you hurry it up a little. She's kinda gaining on me here!"Sonic shouted impatiently, glancing behind him.

Knuckles gave Sonic a punch on the arm to get his attention. "The pink emerald is powered by love...she loves you, you love her! Now do you get it you doofus?"

A look of realisation fell upon Sonics face as he stared at the pink emerald. He threw the red emerald at Knuckles who caught it with ease and took the pink one from Tails outstretched hands. He turned to find Amy and ran in her direction.

She was now in the centre of the stadium. Sonic ran up to her, determination etched on his features, and stopped a few feet before her, clutching the emerald in his hand tighter.

'_I just hope this works'_ he thought nervously.

"Amy..." Sonic looked down at the emerald in his hand, the pink gem was now sparkling lightly. "...there's something I've been meaning to tell you...Amy Rose, I'm in love with you!" he blurted.

Sonic only wish at the time was that his words and the emerald would bring her back to her former self. He locked eyes with her; gold, then green. They kept swopping colours for a couple of seconds before finally deciding to stay a golden yellow.

'_Dang it, it needs more juice. Stupid Eggman and his STUPID STUPID PLANS!'_ Sonic screamed inside his head.

Sonic looked at the emerald one last time before again turning to meet Amy's gaze. Surprisingly she wasn't attacking him, just looking at him motionlessly.

'_Guess this means I have to revert to the last resort...If this doesn't work I don't know what will. Come on emerald, you gotta help me out here!'_

Sonic rushed forward, clutching the emerald close to his heart, he put one arm around Amy's waist and pulled her into him. He briefly looked into her golden eyes before leaning in closer and closing the distance between them.

Tails and Knuckles who were watching from a distance coughed nervously and pretended to be interested in the sand on the ground.

Sonic, kissing the girl passionately on her tender lips was lost in the pure bliss of the moment. He was completely unaware of the sparks flying out from the emerald. Without knowing, Sonic released the emerald and it circled the pair, gradually getting faster and faster before a bright rose coloured light erupted from the gem and engulfed the pair.

Amy's dull golden eyes transformed to a sparkling jade as she realised what was happening. She raised her hands and linked them behind Sonic's neck, kissing him back sweetly.

They both pulled back and Sonic found himself lost in the endless beauty of the lime green eyes before him. Before he could say anything, he found himself being kissed again by Amy Rose and returned it gladly, pulling her closer to deepen the kiss.

Amy Rose was back. The same Amy who loved him to pieces. The same Amy he would give up anything for. The same Amy rose he was in love with.

After what felt like hours, the two pulled apart and gazed affectionately into the others eyes, both entranced by the love held in their eyes.

The emerald sucked back all its light and faded back to its original colour as it landed with a small thump on the ground next to the hedgehogs.

"Amy...? Is it really...you?" Sonic whispered.

"Yes Sonic. It really is." Amy replied, still in shock from the entire experience.

"I'm glad you're okay..." Sonic rested his chin on her forehead as he pulled her in for a hug. Tails and Knuckles approached the two, smiling at the new couple.

"Jeez Sonic, I was expecting something amazing but I was _not_ expecting you to do that!" Knuckles said dramatically causing Sonic to blush lightly.

"Yeah Sonic...way to go buddy!" Tails said whilst clapping Sonic on the back. A wolf whistle sounded, followed by the sounds of flapping wings as a white bat glided down from above them. Sonic just blushed even harder.

"I knew it was only a matter of time before you two hooked up." Rouge stated matter-of-factly.

"And how did you know that, if even I didn't know?" Sonic questioned.

"Let's just call it ladies intuition, okay sweetie" Rouge replied whilst sending a wink in the direction of a certain echidna, causing his cheeks to light up furiously. Knuckles went to go pick up the pink emerald to hide his rosy cheeks.

Sonic felt something tap his shoulder and turned to a pair of watery green eyes. "Sonic? I'm so sorry! I didn't mean to hit you like that but..."

"Amy...It's okay. I know you didn't mean it. It was all Eggman's fault and he's gonna get what he deserves.

"Sonic...do you really..." Amy glanced around her nervously. Sonic nodded before she could finish and she smiled sweetly at him.

"So Rouge, what brings you here?" Sonic asked, pulling Amy close to him. Amy's head felt a bit funny and she started swaying a bit, struggling to stand up straight.

"Well, you know. Amy? Are you okay?" Rouge questioned as Amy clutched her arm in pain.Sonic caught her as her legs buckled and she fell.

"Amy! What's wrong?" Sonic asked in a panicked tone.

Amy couldn't muster up any strength to reply, but just gave him a small smile before passing out in his arms.

"Amy...Amy...AMY!" Sonic shouted, panicking like mad.

"Sonic...it's okay, she'll be fine. I just need to give her the antidote." Tails said calmly, pulling out a bottle of purple liquid.

Sonic eyed the bottle in Tail's hand. "How did you get that?" Tails smiled and nodded towards Rouge.

"Knucky here tipped me off when Eggman left. So I just used my light fingers and borrowed it... without asking of course. I wouldn't want to ruin my reputation now would I?" Rouge answered proudly, pointing towards Knuckles.

Tails laughed at how the echidna had suddenly become speechless and then handed the bottle of purple liquid to Sonic.

Sonic took it gingerly; he removed the cap and placed the neck of the bottle next to Amy's mouth. He slowly poured the contents into her mouth and she swallowed instinctively.

He saw Amy's eyelids flutter slightly and breathed out a sigh of relief.

"I don't understand...If Eggman transformed it into a mind control thing then how can it still be a poison." Sonic asked the two tailed fox.

"When you kissed her, the mind control drug turned back into a poison" Tails stated. Sonic nodded to show he understood. "Thankfully Knuckles was clever enough to get some back-up, otherwise who knows what Eggman might have done with it."

Sonic thanked Knuckles and Rouge to show his appreciation while clapping his little brother on the back.

"Great work you guys. We should probably get out of here. Knuckles, can I have the Emeralds?" Sonic asked as Knuckles handed them over.

Sonic kneeled down and picked up his girlfriend, smiling at the thought of it. He stood up after a moment and turned to the rest of the little group.

"Guys, hold on tight...we're all going home." Sonic said proudly. They all did as they were told and grabbed a hold of Sonic.

"CHAOS CONTROL


	8. The Final Confrontation

The Final Confrontation

'_Doctor Ivo Robotnik, otherwise known as Doctor Eggman, is still wrecking havoc in Station Square. But where is Sonic and his team. Eggman claims that Sonic has been taken care of and looking at the scenes unfolding here it sure looks that way. His robots are tearing the buildings down and many people have fled the square, bar those that have remained to fend off the mad Doctor from completing his...'_

Sonic flicked the radio off before sighing, and returning to sitting on the couch. He was getting incredibly bored of just sitting around doing nothing. People were getting hurt and he wasn't out there helping them, instead he'd been sitting around half the night. What kind of a hero was he?

"TAILS! Can we go now?" Sonic shouted impatiently, through the workshop door, shuffling around impatiently.

"Not quite yet...can you just go find something to do till I call you!" Tails replied, his voice muffled.

"Can I at least go for a run?" Sonic questioned, already knowing the answer to his question.

"SONIC! NO! How many times do I have to tell you, nobody can see you yet" Tails was losing his patience with the blue blur pretty quickly by now. The whole night, Sonic had done nothing but complain that he had to 'go for a run before his legs stayed stuck in slow mode' or he had to 'stop Eggman from destroying the entire universe'.

Sleep had not even crossed the mind of the blue hedgehog. Ever since his 'experience' the day before, Sonic had been bouncing around like crazy, never managing to sit still long enough for anyone to even have a short conversation with him. But eventually the boredom had got to him and he'd reverted to asking pointless questions just for something to do.

Defeated, Sonic trudged upstairs to see if his new girlfriend was up yet. He tiptoed into the room and was slightly disappointed to find Amy still sleeping soundly. He pulled up a chair and sat down next her bed. Well, it was actually his bed but he hardly ever used it. He'd much prefer sleeping on the roof or on a branch all the same.

Sonic gently picked up her hand and stroked the back of it with his thumb; he found that somehow it relaxed him a little. Even though the blue hedgehog was in no mood for sleeping, he rested his head on the side of the bed. The heat from Amy made him close his eyes and he remained like that till morning, not quite asleep, but not fully awake either.

Amy awoke as the first rays of sunlight burst through the window and illuminated her face, waking her from a peaceful sleep.

'_Stupid sunlight'_ Drowsily lifting an eyelid to check the time, she jolted into a sitting position as she came to realise where she was.

'_Wait...this isn't my room, this is...Sonics'_

Glancing to her right she saw Sonic's form leaning on the side of the bed. Sonic lifted an eyelid and mumbled something sleepily before standing up and stretching his limbs.

"Morning sleepyhead" He said as he extended an arm out Amy. She took it gratefully and jumped out of bed, her eyes never leaving the figure before her.

"Umm...Sonic, what am I doing in your room?" Amy asked looking at her surroundings, confusion etched on her pretty features.

"Well, you passed out yesterday and I brought you here so I could keep an eye on you." Sonic replied, turning to glance out of the window.

Amy looked at Sonic curiously before resting her gaze on her shoes. "Uh, Sonic...why did I pass out?"

"Don't you remember anything that happened over the past two days?" Sonic asked incredulously.

'_Typical Sonic, answering a question with another question' _A look of realization fell on her face as she recalled what had happened during the past few days.

'_The poison...and...Tails was...then...fighting Sonic...Eggman...oh my gosh...' _A dazed looked played about her eyes as memories flooded back into her mind, overtaking her thoughts.

Her eyes snapped back into reality and focused on the cerulean hedgehog stood before. Before he had any time to react, Amy had tackled Sonic to the ground and pulled him into a tight hug.

"I am so sorry for hurting you like that. I didn't mean it, honestly. I just couldn't control what I was doing. I'm really sor-"

Amy stopped talking immediately as Sonic pressed a finger onto her lips softly. "I thought I told you yesterday, I don't blame you...just Eggman. And at the moment he thinks that I'm dead...either that or your dead and I'm too upset to come and fight him."

"He does?"

"That's why this is the perfect time to bring him down once and for all." Sonic sat up and gave Amy a thumbs up. "We're gonna teach ol' Eggbutt a lesson"

Amy just smiled and let Sonic help her to her feet, apologizing for tackling him like she had.

"I'm gonna go ask Tails if I can go kick some Eggman butt yet. He's gonna regret ever messing with us." Sonic stated, a hint of hatred radiating off of his words.

Amy nodded whilst slipping her hand into Sonics, a small blush forming on her cheek. He squeezed her hand gently as he led the way to Tails workshop in the garage.

'_I can't believe me and Sonic are finally together...and weirdly, it was because of Eggman'_ Amy couldn't help but smile the whole way to the workshop.

They found Tails under the tornado, fiddling with some wires under the X Tornado.

"Uh...Tails!" Sonic said nervously, using his free hand to rub the back of his head bashfully. In his hurry, Tails hit his head on the bottom of the Tornado. A red faced kitsune soon emerged from under the plane, rubbing his forehead.

"Ow! That hurt..." he mumbled more to himself than anybody else.

"Sorry Tails..." Amy said apologetically.

"Nah, don't worry about it, it was my fault anyway." Tails said, standing up and dusting himself off. "I'm guessing you found something to keep you occupied last night." Tails directed at Sonic.

Sonic grinned sheepishly before sending a nod in his younger brother's direction. At that point, the garage door was swung open and a frantic bat flew in, closely followed by a red-faced echidna. They skidded to a halt before the trio, breathing heavily.

"Eggman...Angel...Island...Master...Emerald...Coming" Knuckles panted out, struggling to talk with lack of air.

Tails eyes widened, as he instructed everyone to get into the X Tornado. They all did so without hesitation. Knuckles took a seat at the rear and Rouge took the one next to him. Leaving the two hedgehogs the seats in front of them with Tails in the driver's seat.

'_Okay, calm down Tails...you just have to get everyone there. Knuckles will tell Sonic and Amy the plan and then we just have to hope that everything works out'_ Tails thought, whilst turning on the engine of the plane.

A familiar whirring noise filled the crew's ears, as the engine started and the workshop door opened. The plane started moving slowly, gradually getting faster and higher setting out a course to Angel Island.

"Sonic!" Knuckles called, now having fully regained his breath. Sonic whipped round in his seat and knocked into Amy in the process, causing her to turn also.

"Yeah?" Sonic breathed back.

"We have a plan on how to get rid of Eggman." Sonic nodded for Knuckles to continue, which he did willingly.

The plane soared over the rolling hills and over Station Square as it came closer and closer to its destination. They reached Angel Island in no more than five minutes thanks to Tails nifty flight skills and the updates to the Tornado.

"Guys, Angel Island is dead ahead." Tails shouted back at his friends.

This caught everyone's attention as they turned to face the floating island which the echidna resided on. In the distance, they could just make out a giant robot heading towards them from the horizon, its huge figure creating a giant shadow.

'_And again with the giant robots... doesn't the dude ever get bored of them'_ Sonic huffed loudly and Amy looked over at him.

"Uh Sonic, are you okay there?" Amy asked, concern riddled in her jade orbs. She reached out and cradled his hand in her own in attempt to comfort him.

Sonic smiled slightly at her, before answering with a simple 'I'm fine' and returning his gaze to the oncoming robot.

The robot itself was easily fifty feet high and resembled a silver version of Metal Sonic. This robot though had six missile launchers on its chest plates and retractable blades that came out of its metallic fists.

It was approaching the island pretty quickly, crushing anything and everything that got in its path, leaving nothing but destruction in its wake.

"Looks like somebody increased their robot allowance." Rouge muttered, her aqua eyes widening with shock as the figure finally became fully visible to them. Knuckles clenched his hands as he too focused on their newest foe. Everyone was too busy watching the oncoming robot that they didn't notice Tails swerve the plane downwards for a quick landing.

The X Tornado landed smoothly enough, Tails pressed a button and the glass shield surrounding the team lifted up in folded into the plane, giving them a way out. Rouge was the first to walk out onto the wing, closely followed by Knuckles, Amy, Sonic and Tails. She hopped elegantly off the wing onto the dusty stone floor that surrounded the master emerald shrine.

Knuckles then jumped off after, holding two chaos emeralds in his hands. The red and pink emeralds shone brighter as they were led closer to the seven platforms that surrounded the master emerald. He nestled them into their original holders and went to stand next to Rouge awkwardly.

Amy was about to jump off the Tornado when she was held back by a hand gripping her wrist. She turned to find herself face to face with the blue wonder himself.

"Amy..." Sonic looked into the confused green eyes of his girlfriend, trying to find ways he could say what he wanted to. Sonic pulled her into her hug and let his lips hover near her ear. "Look, I...I want you to be careful out there, okay" he breathed quietly.

Tails, who was currently behind the couple, acted like he was completely oblivious to the couple before him, side-stepped them and flew off the plane heading towards Knuckles and Rouge.

Both hedgehogs leaned back and gazed into each other's eyes. Sonic ran his fingers through Amy's bangs and pushed them out of the way before placing a soft kiss on her forehead.

"I'll try to, but only if you watch yourself out there too." Amy answered, he gaze focused on Sonic's.

"Hey, I'm Sonic the hedgehog. When have I let some robot get the better of me?" Sonic said, smirking slightly.

"Still, I don't know what I'd do if anything happened to you." Amy whispered back, tears pricking the back of her eyes.

"Me too Ames. We better go; I think the others are getting a little bit impatient." Sonic whispered back, chuckling a little. Amy lightly placed a kiss on his cheek before turning to head for the trio by the master emerald.

"Now they turn up, took you long enough" Knuckles muttered angrily, pacing around the Master Emerald.

"Hey Knucky, save the anger for the robots okay sweetie" Rouge smiled at the echidna as his cheeks reddened considerably.

He simply replied with a 'hmph' before walking up to Tails. "Tails, can I have the three emeralds that you have."

Tails obediently handed over the three emeralds he had previously stashed away in the X Tornado. The green, yellow and orange emeralds were then put securely into their own holders around the master emerald.

"Okay now if my calculations are correct, that machine will need two emeralds at least to even function. Let's just hope Eggman has them both." Tails voiced.

The metal monster was now coming to a halt just before the island, examining the island before it.

"Hah! Eggman, if you wanna attack a flying island, then use a robot that can at least get _onto_ it..." Knuckles shouted sarcastically.

As if on cue, the ground shook violently, causing even to the air around them to vibrate. Two huge jets of flame poured out from under the robots feet, propelling it upwards and one step closer to landing on the island.

"Ya had to jinx it didn't ya" Sonic commented as Knuckles stared at the dirt surrounding his feet.

The gargantuan beast took one final stride and landed on the island as soon as it was high enough and the blast of flames ceased almost immediately.

Out of nowhere, Eggman appeared in his Egg-mobile and peered down at the trio beneath him. He lowered the machine and clambered out to face them. Sonic, having spotted Eggman first, had grabbed Amy and jetted off to hide in the nearest group of trees.

"Ah, so you finally turn up. I was waiting practically all night for you to show yourselves. What happened? Too busy mourning your friends deaths were you?" Eggman let out an evil laugh as Rouge held onto Knuckles arm, stopping him from attacking the doctor.

"I'm guessing they both perished yesterday then, since neither one of them are present. Good riddance, they were always ruining my plans. Especially that blue nuisance, he just couldn't keep his nose out of my private business." Tails smirked slightly as he thought what Eggman would do if he found out that his greatest nemesis was far from dead. Just like Knuckles, Sonic had a sudden urge to pound the living daylights out of the oversized human, but was stopped because Amy was still clinging to his arm.

"Never mind him; I suppose he won't be able to run away from where he is now anyway. But one thing you should mind is my greatest creation yet. I call him the 'Doom Egg'." Eggman announced, his monologue not looking like it was going to end anytime soon.

Knuckles had had enough of the doctors constant babbling and decided it was time to take some action and get the first part of their plan underway. He snatched his arm away from Rouge as he ran forwards. Heading straight for the giant robot, he jumped and jammed his namesakes into the metal, using them to ascend higher up the robot.

'_If I can just get to the head...that's where he always keeps the power-supply. Eggman never changes...' _

Eggman watched in awe as the echidna climbed higher and higher, dragging himself up the armoured monstrosity. As Knuckles got half way up the robot though, Eggman snapped back into his senses and ran into his Egg-mobile, ramming buttons like there was no tomorrow and flying off, mumbling to his controls.

Knuckles felt the robot shake slightly before it started moving, heading towards Tails and Rouge, who had followed Knuckles lead and were also trying to make their way towards the 'Death Eggs' head.

Eggman though was not taking lightly his robot being attacked and was now sending multiple missiles in Tails and Rouge's direction. This made it even harder for them to reach their destination as they avoided the flying bomb's which shook the island as they exploded on the ground.

Sonic and Amy watched as their friend's dodged missile after missile, or clung on for their life. All determined to remove the metal on the head and reveal the power source so that the second part of their plan could commence.

Knuckles was the first to reach the head and was now trying to make some sort of hole through the metal which he could then use to pry it off. Tails was the second to arrive and was using a laser application in his wrist comm. to try and cut through the metal.

Rouge had given up reaching the head when she had realised that two of them were already there, instead, she was now posing as a distraction so that the robot wouldn't realise what was going on. She elegantly swerved out of the way of missiles that had been directed at her and never let her focus leave the launchers so she could see an attack coming from a distance.

'_This is sorta like dancing to a song I've never heard before in mid-air' _she thought to herself as she gracefully swerved under an oncoming projectile.

Tails had finally managed to cut through a piece of the metal, and Knuckles had punched it, leaving a reasonably big hole in the robots head. Unfortunately, the hole had also alerted the robot that the there were two enemies presently resting on his head. It stopped launching missiles and shook its head frantically. Both heroes clung on as hard as they could, their arms started to ache.

'_Uh-oh, their gonna need a real big distraction...and guess who's gonna give it to_ them' Sonic smiled as he gave Amy the thumbs up and ran out to the clearing, leaving a small dusty streak behind him.

"Hey, you big lug, I know your scared but you don't have to shake so much!" Sonic cried.

The robot stopped shaking immediately and looked around him for the source of the noise, giving Knuckles and Tails the perfect opportunity to completely lift the metal plate off its head before the robot realised.

"Down here!" Sonic shouted, tapping his foot impatiently for effect. This caused Amy to giggle slightly as she went to join her hero in the clearing.

The robot looked down and scanned the two hedgehogs before him. A blue laser like light hit the hedgehogs and vanished almost as quickly as it had appeared. "Sources indicate that you two are Sonic the hedgehog and Amy Rose. Sources also indicate that you are deceased." The robot stated in his monotone.

"Negative!" Sonic mocked the robots voice.

"Must inform Doctor Ivo Robotnik of new update to system memory" The robot cried.

"You do that..." Sonic muttered, a smile creeping up his muzzle as he saw the trio settled on the robots head. Knuckles and Tails, with the help of Rouge's nimble fingers had finally managed to remove the plate, revealing two glowing emeralds. One a vibrant blue and the other a clear white.

"Yes!" Shouted Tails, high-fiving Knuckles and Rouge before flying off the robot, and hovering around it instead. Rouge grabbed Knuckles and set him firmly on the ground before joining Tails in the air.

Now that there was no sort of barrier blockading the emeralds power, the emeralds themselves could sense that they were near. This caused a familiar gold glow to emanate from the cerulean hedgehog, who slowly started lifting off the ground higher and higher into the air.

Eggman, having been alerted by his robot of new enemies presumed dead had reappeared, his mouth hung open and eyes wide in shock as he watched the golden hedgehog rise before him.

"YOU!" Eggman cried, pointing an accusing finger at Sonic. "YOUR'E SUPPOSED TO BE DEAD!" The look of incredulity on his face was unmistakable.

"Uh...yup. Oh and my girlfriends down there too." Sonic pointed in the direction of the pink rose below, loving how Eggman's eyes nearly popped out of his head in disbelief.

Amy blushed when Sonic referred to her as his girlfriend but waved sweetly at Eggman all the same, to taunt him further before he came to his senses.

"But you both DIED yesterday..." Eggman babbled, barely able to contain himself.

"What can I say, we hedgehogs die hard!" The golden hedgehog then curled into a ball and rammed right through the centre of the robot emerging on the other side.

"I have to admit, this robot would be quite a challenge...if I wasn't super at the moment." Sonic teased. He then dashed straight at the arms and knocked them right off, causing them to crash to the ground. Luckily the two people who were still on the ground knew enough to stay away from the robot as Sonic finished it off.

Amy and Knuckles had gone to the Master Emerald and Knuckles had both hands up against it, his eyes closed in concentration. Amy watched as one by one, the pillars surrounding the emerald lifted off the ground, the five that contained emeralds were spilling out the coloured light which coincided with the gem placed atop it. They lifted higher and higher until they came to a standstill one hundred metres up in the air.

"Sonic, get the emeralds!" Amy shouted out to her beloved hero. He nodded and flew amidst the remains of the tumbling robot, keeping an eye out for the glowing emeralds. He found and caught them with ease and floated over to their platforms, avoiding the debris of the bot. Placing them into their slots, he watched as they followed suit after the other emeralds and spilled out their own light,

The pillars were now all lit up, causing a magnificent colour display in the early morning sky. Sonic, Tails, Amy, Rouge and Knuckles all fixated on the colour explosion as the colours danced around each other before seeped into one another and merging to form a bright white light.

The light then focused and directed downwards, straight for the Master Emerald, causing it to float upwards and hover at the centre of the pillar circle.

The evil doctor was completely oblivious to the whole display unfolding before him; he was too busy focusing on his CCTV footage of yesterday's ordeal.

'_So that's how they survived...why I didn't check this stupid tape beforehand'_ he mentally slapped himself before watching the rest of the tape.

"SONIC, NOW!" Tails cried as he flew over to join Knuckles, Rouge and Amy in the Emerald shrine. Sonic flew towards the Master Emerald and ground to a stop before it. He reached his hands out to touch the giant jewel, fully hoping that their plan would work.

As soon as his hands made contact with the cold surface of the gem, Sonic felt a huge surge of energy pass through him, sending sparks straight through him. His nerves jolted as the power coursed around him.

'_Old Eggy won't be expecting this...' _He thought, as a small smirk crept its way onto his lips. Sonic opened his golden eyes, only now realising that he had shut them. He focused on his greatest enemy and wielded the power the best he could in that direction.

Sonic managed to redirect the powerful light right at his foe, and with a final grunt of strength sent it soaring through the air. As the light collided with the Eggmobile and engulfed him a circle, it sent a powerful impact towards the ground causing the creatures of Angel Island to be flung into the air helplessly.

Sonic, being quick on the mark quickly flew to the aid of his rosette girlfriend, while Tails and Rouge both grabbed a hold of Knuckles, keeping him from a hard landing. The light surrounding Eggman eventually died down and where Eggman had once been remained nothing but a battered Eggmobile, which was falling quickly to the ground.

"Alright Sonic!" Tails shouted in triumph, as he and Rouge lowered Knuckles to the ground.

Sonic however remained exactly where he was, the pink hedgehog cradled in his strong arms. Looking deep into her green eyes, the cerulean hedgehog found nothing but love and compassion.

Tilting her head up slightly with his gloved hands, he placed his lips softly on hers. A burst of passion and love exploded from the couple as they caressed each other lovingly. The electric sensation raced around them and they pulled away slowly, their lips still tingling and gazes locked onto the other, gold into silver.

"Hey Ames..." Sonic whispered, a cocky smile now creeping onto his face. "Check you out..."

Amy looked up at him confused as a lock of hair fell in front of her eyes. She gasped as the silver glow erupting from her fur and quills.

"Sonic...!" She whined, still confused. "Why am I silver?" She asked; panic now creeping into her voice.

"Uh...because you just kissed me in my super form..." Sonic chuckled as he rested his forehead on hers. "I always wanted to know what would happen if I did that..."

That earned Sonic a playful punch as the two burst out laughing in mid-air. The couple lowered to the ground slowly as the power of the emeralds gradually died down. The pillars were now also lowering to their original places around the shrine.

When the two hedgehogs met the ground, both now their original colour, Sonic gently set Amy down onto her own feet, keeping a soft grip on her hand. Tails, Knuckles and Rouge approached the two, all three bearing a puzzled look.

"A-Amy...were you...super?" Knuckles spluttered, unable to keep it in any longer.

Amy giggled slightly and let Sonic do the explaining. When he'd finished he turned his attention to Tails.

"Tails, does that light mean that Eggman's gone for good?" Sonic questioned.

Tails nodded enthusiastically before beginning his explanation. "You see, that light controls space time... and matter itself. By directing the light at Eggman, you officially erased him from this world."

"But, if he was erased then why do we remember him?" It was now Rouge's turn to ask the questions. She looked at the kitsune quizzically.

"Well, the light didn't erase him from time itself, only from the future. If the light had erased him completely, then life itself would be different. Me and Sonic would have never known each other. Sonic wouldn't have had to rescue Amy, and would never have fallen in love with her. We probably wouldn't even know you two." Tails pointed at Knuckles and Rouge, his eyes wide.

"Yup, life would be boring..." Sonic admitted, pulling Amy in for a hug.

"Urgh, I know you two are kinda official now, but do you mind sharing your feelings in private." Knuckles moaned.

"Aww, Knucky, do you feel a little left out. I mean, Tails has Cream and all." This caused Tails to blush brightly and he turned away from the group, muttering something about the X Tornado.

"Why would I feel left out I mea-" Knuckles stopped in mid-sentence as he felt a warm pressure on his cheek. He turned to find Rouge smiling at him sweetly, before she flew off into the morning sky. He himself was now blushing furiously and headed over to the Master Emerald. Hoping that Sonic and Amy weren't watching what had just happened, and didn't see the huge blush had crept its way onto his cheeks.

Amy and Sonic smiled at each other knowingly as they watched their three friends hurry off to do their own things.

The chaos emeralds finally faded into a vibrant solid colour and erupted into the air, once again flying off to find new places to lie in wait. Leaving behind seven glittery multi-coloured streaks in the sky which faded into a shimmering hue.

This was going to be a truly beautiful morning, and the start of a new life. Not just for the hedgehogs...but for the whole world. A world more peaceful and harmonious than it was before.

...xxx...

This chapter's not much different from what it was before...oh well

Thank you for reading and putting up with this story a second time round, and thansk to everyone who reviewed. I really do appreciate it. I was supposed to put this up days ago but...I just didn't get round to it.

Anyways, I hope you guys enjoyed it and happy 2011! Chao ;)


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